
Book ^ 



°-«~^-M 2- 



THE WORKER 
AND THE STATE 



THE WORKER AND 
THE STATE 

A STUDY OF EDUCATION 
FOR INDUSTRIAL WORKERS 



BY 

ARTHUR D. DEAN, S.B. 

CHIEF, DIVISION OF TRADE-SCHOOLS, NEW YORK 
STATE EDUCATION DEPARTMENT 



WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY 

ANDREW S. DRAPER 

COMMISSIONER OP EDUCATION OP THE STATE OF NEW YORK 




^a^y>^f^^g^€S 



NEW YORK 
THE CENTURY CO. 

1910 



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^ 
Q 



Copyright, 1910, by 
The Century Co. 



Published, October, 1910 



J. F. TAPLEY CO. 

NEW YORK 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

Introduction . •. i., ;. :. i.i i.: . . u-. u d . ■.. xiii 



PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE . . .., . . . . . . . 3 

Dependence upon the past — No present path leads to 
craftsmanship — The call of industry — iHandwork as a 
handmaid — Manual vs. industrial training — Some defi- 
nite needs — Intelligence, adaptability and appreciation 
— Arousing the social consciousness — Typical state 
movements — Significance of national appropriations — 
A popular movement — Evolution not revolution — Pres- 
ent contentions — An earnest attempt — A new concep- 
tion. 

II 

THE EDUCATIONAL SIGNIFICANCE OF MODERN INDUSTRY . . 25 

Industrialism at every point — Our slave or its slave? — 
Tremendous possibilities — Main system of industry — 
Have we industrial feudalism ? — Housework stage — 
Beginning of the wage system — The guild move- 
ment — Commission system starts — Coming of the in- 
dustrial revolution — Dependence upon the capitalist — 
A record of misery — Agitation begins — A voice of 
protest — A process of adaptation — Secret of the fac- 
tory's strength — Every factor utilized — A mighty in- 
crease in volume — Differentiation of labor — Where 
have we erred? — The point of attack — The gate of 
opportunity — Avoiding wasted energy — Development of 
social conscience — Pay back to the workers — Relation 

V 



VI CONTENTS 

PAGE 

of the worker to the whole — Economic basis for culture 
— Industrial freedom — Offsetting the monotony — 
Standing for the best. 

Ill 

WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY .... ., ,. . ., . 61 

Two classes of vocations — Women have always worked — 
Begin to work in the factory — Past and present — An 
entering wedge — Breaking down old lines — A weak po- 
sition — A new occupation — From home to factory — 
Men and women — The sweat shop — Where will it 
end ? — Industrial training necessary — Study of women's 
occupations — • Claims of society — An experiment sta- 
tion — Meeting working conditions — Which shall it 
be ? — Importance of the home — Home-keeping a pro- 
fession — Extension of the public school — Lack of in- 
dustrial spirit — The servant question — Call of the 
factory and store — Problem of service — Vocation and 
homemaking — Need of readjustment — The family 
budget — Animals vs. people — The chemistry of living — 
A well dressed woman — A study of textiles — Connec- 
tion with other studies — The house we live in — The 
dignity of it all — Wage earning and homemaking — The 
two-fold purpose. 

IV 

EDUCATION FOR THE WASTED YEARS . .110 

Attitude of the boy — Unprofitable work — The inevitable 
result — Attitude of parents — The depth of the prob- 
lem — Leaving school — Simplification and elimination — 
Choice of vocation — Types of children — Cultural vs. 
vocational — Social significance — General aim — Length 
of course — Arousing industrial interests — Scheme 
of instruction — The " bookwork " — The " practical 



CONTENTS vii 

PAGE 

work " — A record of graduates — An experiment with 
girls — An end to bring about. 

V 

TRADE-SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN „, . 147 

Work dignified — Genuine respect for labor — Educa- 
tional point of view — An economic consideration — Our 
foreign trade — Raw materials vs. finished products — 
The raw product — The American spirit — The next step 

— Factors in production — Adaptability of labor — An 
imaginary difficulty — Evolution of employments — What 
constitutes skill — A broad division — Job or vocation 

— The public trade-school — School vs. shop — Distinct 
field — Requirements for admission — Manual training 
vs. trade training — An academic objection — The Wil- 
liamson School of Trades — The objector answered. 

VI 

TRADE UNIONS AND TRADE SCHOOLS 189 

Education and labor — Danger of specialization — Public 
or private control — Place of the graduate — Time of 
entrance into trades — Supplemental training — Labor's 
first step — A definite program — Report of 1909 Com- 
mittee — Position taken abroad — An important investi- 
gation — Labor and capital. 

VII 

CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF INDUSTRIAL TRAININa 211 

Factory waste — Boy economy — The plan of operation — 
An educational innovation — Conflict of opinions — Ad- 
vantages of both — Standpoint of equipment — Stand- 
point of teachers — Wasting time and money — Learn 
and earn — Cooperation between shop and school — Sen- 
timent of trade unions — Application to other trades — 



viii CONTENTS 

PAGE 

An interesting experiment — A plan for high schools — 
The book studies — A valid objection — A better plan — 
Advantages — A summing up. 

VIII 

SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 247 

Passing of the old order — Early apprenticeship — Its 
decadence — Absence of personal relations — Revolution 
of industry — Attitude of employer — Attitude of em- 
ployee — Attitude of boy — A natural death — Perpetua- 
tion of skill — Good, bad and indifferent — A modern 
system — School in the factory — Apprentice vs. foreman 

— Remedying the evil — The result — Another phase — 
Well defined advantages — Facing the truth — Trade- 
unions and apprenticeship — A development occasioning 
apprehension — A discouraging note — The bearing upon 
industrial education — From fourteen to sixteen — The 
lesson to learn. 

IX 

SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO INDUSTRY . .318 

Educational field — Agencies of supplemental education — 
Making up deficiencies — Personal advancement — Prin- 
ciples to be established — On an independent basis — As- 
sociation with daily life — Contact with outside world — 
Credit for the work done — Evening schools for indus- 
trial workers — Vital needs — Teachers make the school 

— The direct appeal — Flexible courses — Sequence of 
courses — Departmental system unsuitable — Classifica- 
tions by vocations — Special text-books — What may be 
done — Advantage of the plan — Making a beginning. 



CONTENTS ix 

^ PAGE 
A DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES 318 

Nature of the problem — A chasm to be bridged — Se- 
lection of vacation — Conservation of children — A justi- 
fiable expense — No single solution — A look into the 
future — An organic relationship — A restratification — 
Articulation with labor laws — A new and important 
step — To work it out — The state and the nation — A 
vital point — Shall we isolate it ? — Confidence of all 
interests — Boy is the product — Suitable teachers — A 
bit of philosophy. 

XI 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 345 



PEEFACE 

ONCE in my youth I was struggling over the calk- 
ing of a boat. A neighbor, rushed with the cares 
of a busy life, extended his assistance. At the com- 
pletion of his half day of service I asked, with hesitancy, 
how I could repay him. He replied, *' Young man, if 
you ever have an opportunity to help anyone calk a 
boat, do it, for only by passing it along will my service 
become paid.'' 

Men and women, leaders in their chosen fields, have 
given me freely of their time, inspiration and counsel. 
If ''to repay" means *'to pass along," then I am more 
than glad to offer this book to the public. 

Arthur D. Dean. 
Albany, N. Y., May 4, 1910. 



:d 



INTRODUCTION 

THE intellectual, moral, political and industrial ac- 
tivities of a people are closely related. They are 
interdependent. A moral people without mental de- 
velopment v^ould be as insipid as an intellectual people 
with little moral sense would be undependable. It 
would make little difference in the end how highly de- 
veloped a people might be in mentality or feeling if they 
were not given to work. And neither mental, moral, 
nor manual energy would make headway without po- 
litical freedom. These suggestions seem idle because the 
supposition in each case seems so impossible. Yet it is 
a matter of degree both in the premise and in the de- 
duction. A people half developed intellectually will be 
more superstitious than moral, and one not inured to 
physical effort and endurance will be as lacking in men- 
tal and moral as in bodily strength. So a people vdth 
wits and moral sensibilities who know the joy of labor 
will gain political freedom and establish political in- 
stitutions; and their heads and their hearts and the 
work of their hands will prosper so long as their activi- 
ties are sufficiently in equilibrium to hold what they 
have gained. 

ziii 



sdv INTRODUCTION 

It seems as though the people of the United States 
have understood this thing fairly well. The present 
generation ought to understand it better than the last 
or the one before that, and there are some evidences 
that it does. The part of it which we have not com- 
pletely realized, or have not known quite how to realize, 
is the factor which relates to industrial efficiency. We 
have steadily advanced in intellectual culture; litera- 
ture, the fine arts, and philosophy are surely abroad in 
the land. Rational and sincere morality has steadily ex- 
panded. We have exercised our political independence 
until we are beginning to realize its inevitable limita- 
tions and to understand how very interdependent we 
really are. If we have fallen short anywhere it is in 
the fact that we have allowed our endless natural re- 
sources, the advent of labor-saving machines, the glare 
of the city and its mansions, and our universal ambi- 
tion for commercial or political advancement, to dull 
our understanding of the vital importance of widely ex- 
tended and thoroughly diffused industry and skill on 
the part of individual men and women. 

The causes which have tended to break the equilibrium 
have been more numerous and more active here than in 
any other progressive land. Many have seen the diffi- 
culty and tried to meet it. It could be met only by gov- 
ernment, and government has not responded. While 



INTRODUCTION xv 

more and more of every kind of training has of necessity 
devolved upon the schools, they have persistently, almost 
blindly, adhered to courses of work which promoted in- 
tellectual culture exclusively. Their work and influence 
have tended almost wholly towards professional employ- 
ments. Even when the people have demanded that the 
schools train in the industries, they have responded with 
manual training departments or schools of a middle or 
secondary grade, which, so far as they accomplished any 
substantial end, have trained boys for higher technical 
schools and headed them for the engineering professions. 
Indeed, the enthusiastic supporters of these schools have 
not hesitated to declare this as their purpose, or that the 
idea was merely to cultivate the mind through the skill 
and deftness of the hand. Seldom has a school an- 
nounced that its first aim was to train boys to be real 
workmen, and girls to know something of the household 
arts. They have not been trained to help themselves 
and their country with their hands. That is what is 
wanted. The rest will take care of itself. It is well 
enough settled now that there will never be any lack 
of training schools for all manner of professions in 
America. But three-quarters of the boys and girls are 
to do the best for themselves and their country in manual 
rather than professional employments. And when boys 
and girls have been trained to be workers, they will not 



xvi INTRODUCTION 

only be cultured through their work, but in this land of 
opportunities, they will make such advances toward lead- 
ership of every kind as their qualities deserve. 

It may also be pointed out that this is not wholly a 
matter of individual or personal concern. It is a matter 
of very great moment to the nation. We exercise polit- 
ical freedom in the fullest and largest sense. Every 
decade brings new evidence that the people expect to use 
their political power more and more. All that really 
count in America are workers, either efficient or in- 
different. The idlers, either rich or poor, are hardly 
in the reckoning. If they are in the reckoning at all, 
the reckoning will still be done by men and women who 
work. Even more, it is not too much to say that the 
political policies of this country are being determined, 
and are going to be determined, by men and women who 
work with their hands, and essentially by wage earners. 

It is vital that this political freedom be used by men 
and women in whom the mental, moral, and industrial 
forces are balanced. Before it is, industrial skill will 
have to be more widely diffused and the general average 
of it will have to be lifted to a distinctly higher plane 
of skill and efficiency. We need to get to the point 
just as quickly as we can when it will not be necessary 
to speak of an English gardener, or a German mechanic, 
or a Danish farmer, or a Swiss watchmaker, with special 
unction, because there will be any number of American 



INTRODUCTION xvii 

gardeners, mechanics, farmers and watchmakers quite as 
efficient as any that are to be found anywhere in the 
world. When that point is reached the Republic will 
be safe enough, and all the people who are deserving 
will not only have better and happier and more contented 
homes, but intellectually and morally they will be a 
stronger and therefore a more steadfast and dependable 
people. 

It is now clear enough that this will have to be largely 
accomplished through the American schools. It is so 
whether the schools wish it or not. The people them- 
selves are making the demand. They have asked bread 
of the schools before, and been given a stone. That has 
not been wholly or even largely the fault of the schools. 
The schools have not seen clearly what to do, and when 
they do see they can not radically change their work 
and their plans until the people act in an organized way. 
The law must authorize and the money must be provided. 
No matter where the fault has been, or whether there has 
been any fault, the fact is that great numbers of the 
plain people have withdrawn their children from the 
schools before completing the elementary course, for the 
too apparent reason that they did not think it worth 
while to have them remain. It is the business of the 
schools to serve the masses so as to make it worth their 
while to have their children remain in school not only 
until they have acquired the elements of an English 



xviii INTRODUCTION 

education but also such efficiency as will qualify them 
for some gainful vocation, and a vocation of the hand 
quite as much as one of the head. 

Three years ago or more the New York State Educa- 
tion Department cut loose from established traditional 
usage in the hope of accomplishing something substan- 
tial in this direction. It -undertook to bring about an 
entirely new class of school. Its plan left the great 
elementar^^ school system intact except that it under- 
took, by eliminating fanciful exploitation and retaining 
only the essential elements of linguistic and mathematical 
knowledge, to provide an elementary course of six rather 
than eight years, which should be general in character 
and adapted to all children; with an additional two 
years' course which introduced new features calculated 
to gain the interest of children in and enlarge their 
respect for the mechanical and agricultural industries. 
Its plan contemplates the compulsory attendance of 
pupils upon this elementary course until they have com- 
pleted it. And then the plan sets up the new class 
of schools, for boys and girls, open daytime or evening, 
so ordered as to encourage attendance while earning a 
living in whole or in part, and teaching the fundamentals 
of every vocation for which there should be sufficient de- 
mand in the neighborhood. Of course pupils would go 
to the present high schools, or to the manual-training 
high schools if they preferred. The necessary legislation 



INTRODUCTION xix 

and the financial aid of the State of New York have been 
secured, and the development of the new system has gone 
steadily forward. 

Mr. Arthur D. Dean, the author of this book, has had 
charge of this work from the beginning. For several 
years he super^dsed the vocational work in the Summer 
School of Cornell University as well as in evening schools 
established by a considerable number of Young IMen's 
Christian. Associations in Massachusetts and Rhode 
Island. He has doubtless traveled more than anyone 
else in attending educational conferences and meetings of 
labor organizations bearing upon the subject, and he has 
addressed popular audiences gathered to consider it in 
all parts of New York State. His sympathies are with 
the plain people and he has considered all of the phases 
and bearings of this all-important matter. He has writ- 
ten comprehensively and what he says deserves the at- 
tention of all who want to do what they can for the 
people and the Republic. 

The manuscript chapters convince me that the book 
covers a much more rational, philosophical, practical and 
far-reaching treatment of a vital subject than has here- 
tofore been presented. 

Andrew S. Draper. 
May 20, 1910. 



THE WORKER AND THE STATE 



THE WORKER AND THE 

STATE 



PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE 

WE are all familiar with that part of the 
story of "Through a Looking Glass" 
where Alice of Wonderland fame, running hand 
in hand with the Queen and going so fast that she 
can hardly keep up while the Queen continually 
cries "Faster! Faster !'' asks between gasps of 
breath: "Are we nearly there!" 

As the Queen lets her rest awhile against a 
tree, Alice looks around and remarks, "Why, I do 
believe we have been under this tree the whole 
time! Everything 's just as it was!" 

"Of course it is," replies the Queen; "what 
would you have it?" 

Still panting a little, Alice replies, "Well, in 
our country you 'd generally get to somewhere 
else — if you ran very fast for a long time as 
we 've been doing." 

"A slow sort of country!" says the Queen. 
"Now, herCy you see, it take& all the running you 

3 



4 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

can do to keep in the same place. If you want 
to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice 
as fast!'' 

With modern industrialism in the character of 
the Queen and our educational traditions assum- 
ing the role of Alice we might easily develop an 
allegory applicable to the present educational and 
industrial situation in this country. 

Gradually we are learning that tremendous 
industrial forces have been developing with no 
adequate recognition of the schools and that it 
will require all the running that our educational 
policy can do to keep in the same place and if it 
wants to get somewhere else it must run at least 
twice as fast. 

Dependence upon the past. 

In our educational practice there has been a 
universal dependence upon the interpretation of 
the past, and a general belief that an acquaint- 
ance with history, literature, art and Orientalism 
not only broadens the horizon, but also fits one to 
meet the changing conditions of modern life and 
gives an understanding of present-day problems. 

Such a policy has been expected to mark in- 
delibly the various callings of life. With it a 
man was to become a truer citizen, a better em- 
ployer, a more conscientious workman; with it, 
the more a man would enjoy his work, whatever 



PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE 5 

his trade or profession, the more inclined he 
would be to fit in with the existing industrial 
order, and the more intelligently appreciative of 
his civic duties and responsibilities. More than 
two-score years ago John Stuart Mill in a few 
words expressed this conception of education as 
being *'the culture which one generation gives to 
the next in order that the culture already existing 
may continue." 

Altogether it was an interesting philosophy. 
But is it not incomplete? Has not the present 
generation obligations to the next quite apart 
from making it the beneficiary of past expe- 
rience? Are we not expected to make conscious 
effort to prepare boys and girls for the future 
not only by perpetuating what we believe is best 
in our civilization, but also by anticipating social 
and industrial conditions bound to exist in the 
future ? 

No present path leads to craftsmanship. 

In its industrial phases our present generation 
differs vastly from the last. We see that boys 
and girls have been led away from the crafts and 
the home and that they no longer desire to learn 
a trade of the shop or household; and that in- 
dividual skill and experience are largely discon- 
nected in the monotonous toil of department store 
and factory. One of the noblest of callings, that 



6 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

of tilling the soil, has so far deteriorated in com- 
mon estimation that a particularly awkward boy 
is derided by the term ^^ farmer." We find onr 
workers in the factory, in the counting room and 
in the store, regarding their work in terms of 
hours and wages with little thought of craftsman- 
ship, for which hours and wages are but the 
material symbols. 

The call of industry. 

We have now confronting us a serious problem. 
We are summoned by the constructive spirit of a 
busy world to work out a system of education 
which shall hold a definite and intimate relation- 
ship to the industrial activities of life — ^vast pub- 
lic and private enterprises which are enlisting 
every grade of human energy and skill, from the 
foreign alien and unskilled laborer, distinguished 
only by his badge number, to the captain of in- 
dustry. 

It is possible in a measure to anticipate some 
of the needs of the future. It will need, as does 
the present, a general intelligence, a refinement 
of manner and thought ; in common with the pres- 
ent, it will need the exercise of hand skill, and it 
will need a new understanding of obligation in 
labor, to individuals and to the state. A thought- 
ful leader of workingmen has said that boys and 
girls need a training which will enable them to 



PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE 7 

earn readily and honestly good wages which they 
must spend wisely. Now, earning readily im- 
plies a technical skill; earning honestly, the in- 
dustrial exercise of the Golden Rule; spending 
wisely, a training in manners, morals and taste. 
The technical skill alone of a craft is fairly easy 
to master. It is not difficult for a girl to learn 
to cook, but the art is not wholly mastered if not 
accompanied by habits of cleanliness, order and 
economy. To teach a boy to saw, to plan furni- 
ture, to adjust machinery, is a simple task com- 
pared with that of training in him a social con- 
science which will make him feel his obligations 
to his employer and the public. 

We have had for a quarter of a century, some 
form of industrial work in our public schools, but 
its advocates have carefully avoided any voca- 
tional aspect it might have. It has found its 
place in the curriculum and if at the present time 
that place be small, it is due in a large measure to 
the fact that its friends took the path of least 
resistance and allowed it to become merely a sub- 
ject in the curriculum instead of providing it with 
an educational content which would make it 
worthy of a primary place in our schools. 

Handwork as a handmaid. 

Undoubtedly, the older conception of manual 
training was that of handmaid to the academic 



8 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

work of the school. If the pupil did not com- 
prehend that two and one-half and three and 
three-fourths made six and one-fourth by the use 
of arithmetical processes, it was considered a 
profitable task to prove to him the result in the 
making of a box. If he did not display honesty, 
neatness and painstaking effort in writing a com- 
position or taking care of his school desk, many 
a teacher of manual training asserted that he 
would acquire these qualities if he made a 
taboret. If he did not like to soil his hands by 
carrying coal for his mother, or developed a dis- 
taste for chopping kindlings, then sawing boards 
and driving nails in a school-room would create 
a love for manual labor and a belief in its dignity. 
Such manual training has not, and never will 
have, any effect on industries or the education of 
industrial workers, for it is founded on a false 
basis — to accomplish something in a school-room 
by doing something else. No one can rightly as- 
sert that the present courses in handwork in our 
public schools have no educational, industrial, or 
social value. They were originally introduced as 
a part of a new system of education, but either 
through a general misunderstanding of their im- 
port, or because the times were not ripe, they have 
become merely, as one has aptly phrased it, ^'a 
sort of mustard relish, an appetizer '^ — to be con- 
ducted without reference to any industrial end. 



PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE 9 

Manual vs. industrial training. 

At present there is mucli contention over the 
relative value of manual training and industrial 
education. Kegardless of terminology, the right 
kind of hand training in the schools must not 
only develop in the pupil an absorbing interest 
in his work and a consciousness of its value, but 
must give him a sense of his individual relation 
to the whole industrial system. But the teaching 
of the use of tools in a corner of a school building 
for one period a week, with no definite industrial 
purpose in mind, has about as much relation to 
industrial training as the making of a coat-hanger 
has to constructing a modern battleship. 

Industrial training need not have technical skill 
as its only goal, and yet the training for skill must 
be recognized as of primary importance in estab- 
lishing a proper relation of handwork to indus- 
trial life. Skill is not the only element that 
contributes to the value of the result; it also in- 
volves the way in which the result is reached. 
For true efficiency there must be no waste of time 
or energy; there must be a straight-to-the-goal 
method of working. Courses in handwork should 
imply a developing of the process of observation 
and initiative, of a desire for personal excellence 
of workmanship; of an attitude of mind, both 
social and industrial. These qualities of head, 
hand and heart should be at the base of every call 



10 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

for service whether it be under the name of 
manual training or industrial education. 

Some definite needs. 

We are still wandering in the tall grass in a 
search for some phase of education that will make 
for industrial efficiency. Before determining the 
procedure which will bring about the desired end, 
we may well ask ourselves the question: What is 
demanded in the industrial world? A prominent 
manufacturer, speaking with the authority of a 
national textile organization, recently stated that 
while the advanced textile schools which could 
cover more advanced work than our public 
schools, were of great advantage it still remained 
true that the preliminary operations of the fac- 
tory do not require a high order of technical skill ; 
that processes easily acquired when young are 
almost beyond attainment after a certain age, and 
that a grown woman can never learn to spin 
deftly — that the mental requirements are es- 
sentially those of discipline. It would thus ap- 
pear that while there is need for special textile 
schools there is a larger demand for supple fin- 
gers and general intelligence — for the training 
practicable in the public schools. In the machine 
trades the call is for a number of broadly-trained 
men, a relatively larger proportion of skilled men 
to unskilled men than is required in any other in- 



PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE 11 

dustry. A machinist and a pattern maker need 
to have considerable ability to read drawings, to 
adjust special tools and fixtures, and to interpret 
mathematical tables and formulae. Managers 
in these trades point to the growing demand for 
special machines which the industry is called upon 
to build and to the ever-increasing use of auto- 
matic machinery. They claim, however, that this 
development will not eliminate the mechanic of 
general and broad training. The perfection of 
machinery calls for more intelligence to make and 
repair the highly-perfected machine. It is true 
that the mechanic of to-day needs a special train- 
ing; but he also needs as a foundation for this, 
the general mechanical principles taught in the 
public schools. The shoe industry points to a 
need of workers with a dexterity of hand, arm 
and back which will allow the body to adapt its 
movements to those of the machine, the efficient 
workman being one who keeps step with his 
machine in its speed and its varying motions of 
mechanical parts. This industry, in common 
with textiles, demands a few specially trained 
men, but the great cry is for workers with dex- 
terity and character. In the jewelry and art 
metal industry there is a call for more workers 
with an art sense, with power to originate and 
execute products with distinctive features in 
order that we may have a handicraft, individual 



12 THE AVORKER AND THE STATE 

and typical. The workers in the forest, in the 
mine, the multitude of laborers in our public en- 
terprises of subways, streets and railroads speak 
for themselves, for so far no one has included 
these vast numbers of workers in any scheme of 
technical training. They cry out for shorter 
hours, more pay, a living wage, a higher standard 
of living. For the most part their education will 
not go beyond that drawn from the elementary 
schools. For these, handwork in our public 
schools can do much; it can develop a standard of 
lahor-sJiip which must be the foundation of any 
true improvement in the condition of our so-called 
unskilled laborers. 

Broadly speaking, everyone needs to be trained 
to work, to like it and to do it well. Labor as 
a factor in education is too important a principle 
in individual development to be longer ignored. 
We must not have our boys and girls spend so 
much time with their books that they will miss an 
education. In too many cases education is a 
means to an end — the avoidance of work. 

Intelligence, adaptahility and appreciation. 

Careful analysis of the movement for industrial 
education will show that it springs from two 
sources; first, from the skilled industries, those 
trades where specialized machinery with its dif- 
ferentiation of processes has made so many 



PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE 13 

macliine tenders while eliminating the all-round 
mechanic fitted for duties of supervision; and 
second, from all industries, both skilled and un- 
skilled, where there is a need for intelligence, 
adaptability and general appreciation of work. 
What is demanded is not only technical skill but 
a proper attitude of mind. The president of a 
large railroad remarked in a recent statement 
that every raise in wages had seemed to be ac- 
companied with a decreased efficiency. The heads 
of industries which require but few skilled 
workers when asked what industrial education 
should do for the mass of their employees, usually 
enter into a discussion of present-day inefficiency, 
incompetency, and irresponsibility, implying that 
the public schools are at fault. When pressed for 
a solution of the problem and for a definite sug- 
gestion they offer some such one as this: Give 
the pupils an understanding of the industrialism 
of the city, tell them about the raw material, 
where it comes from, how it gets to the city, the 
way it is manufactured, the value of the finished 
product, the part that labor, the investment and 
the capitalist play in this process. In short, give 
industrialism a background that the workers may 
grow to be interested in and feel themselves a 
part of the industries that employ them. 

With equal force much might be said with 
reference to the attitude of the employing public 



14 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

toward labor and those who express it. A notion 
exists, altogether too prevalent, that education 
leading to labor is for the son of the '^ other fel- 
low.'' When one mentions the subject of training 
for efficiency, the lawyer, the machinist, the min- 
ister, and the farmer all stand in a circle with 
their index finger pointing to the man at their 
right. 

Arousing the social consciousness. 

The time has come for a forward step in edu- 
cation and the significance of the new movement 
looking to the establishment of industrial and 
trades schools may be measured by the following 
brief survey of the present status of industrial 
education. 

As has been well stated by Prof. Elliott 
of the University of Wisconsin, ''the trend of the 
development of our public school system is de- 
termined by the mutual reaction of two forces : — 
first, a static public sentiment which would leave 
the existing order undisturbed ; second, a progres- 
sive consciousness of the new needs of contem- 
porary life which constantly endeavors to embody 
itself in legislation.*' This arousing of the 
social consciousness is nowhere better illustrated 
than in the endeavor to adjust the American 
school system to the needs of the new industrial 
order. This endeavor has recorded itself on the 



PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE 15 

legislative annals in a number of plans for the 
elevation of the standards of industrial efficiency. 
But, of course, laws of themselves do not spon- 
taneously develop high standards of educational 
efficiency, and such efficiency is not likely to come 
through the unstimulated activity of public 
opinion. The National Society for the Promo- 
tion of Industrial Education has done much to 
arouse national interest ; for localities and varied 
interests need energizing through progressive 
state legislation which recognizes that education 
is a concern of the state and not merely a local 
responsibility. 

Beginning with the Commission created in 
Massachusetts in 1905 ^^to consider the needs for 
technical education in the different grades of in- 
dustrial skill and responsibility," six other states 
have inaugurated special investigations upon this 
problem. Already the report of this Commission 
has served to stimulate activity for the reconstruc- 
tion of old-school programs and the projection of 
schools with entirely new bases and ends. 

Typical state movements. 

From the very considerable number of legisla^ 
tive enactments having to do with practical and 
technical training in schools of elementary and 
secondary grade, the following may be mentioned 
as typical, no attempt being made to cover all 



16 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

legislation dealing with the subject. The State of 
Connecticut has established two public trade 
schools, money for the support of the same being 
provided for from public funds. These schools 
are located at New Britain and Bridgeport. 
Eecently the legislatures of Georgia and Utah 
passed resolutions recommending appropriations 
by Congress for industrial education. By doing 
this they hope to throw all the financial responsi- 
bility on the national government. However, in 
1906 the first mentioned state provided for dis- 
trict schools of agriculture and mechanic arts. 
Maryland in 1908 provided state aid to establish 
commercial courses in approved high schools. 
Massachusetts in 1909 reorganized its State 
Board of Education and abolished its Industrial 
Education Commission. But the new Board was 
required by law to have in its membership one 
representative of the former Commission. A 
Deputy Commissioner of Education has been 
selected to have special charge of the field of in- 
dustrial education. Michigan and Mississippi 
have passed laws providing for the establishment 
of county schools of agriculture, manual train- 
ing and domestic economy. In a revision of the 
education laws of New York State in 1910 pro- 
vision was made for the establishment of agri- 
cultural and homemaking schools, as well as gen- 
eral industrial and trade schools previously 



PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE 17 

provided for and supported partly by the state 
and partly by the locality. New Jersey has fol- 
lowed closely the experience of Massachusetts, 
having a special commission which investigated 
the matter of industrial education and afterwards 
having the new movement incorporated into the 
older State Board. Oklahoma in 1908 created a 
system of agricultural and industrial education, 
while Wisconsin provided in 1907 for the estab- 
lishment of trade schools within the state, includ- 
ing a state mining trade school as well as such 
other schools typifying the various industries in 
the state as local communities saw fit to establish. 
A trade school has been established at Milwaukee 
and at present a state commission is working out 
a propaganda for a wide extension of such schools 
all over the state. This state in common with 
Minnesota has a comprehensive scheme of 
secondary agricultural education with partial 
state support. 

Significance of national appropriations. 

There has been a marked movement towards 
advancing the interests of agricultural colleges. 
The influence of this legislation according to 
Prof. Elliott in his review of recent educa- 
tional legislation for a bulletin of the New York 
State Library has been in three principal direc- 
tions: first, extraordinary appropriations for the 



18 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

conduct of special investigations and instruction 
including extension work, forestry, mining, horti- 
culture, soil, poultry raising and dry farming; 
second, the establishment of new schools; and, 
third, the organization of instruction for the 
training of teachers of agriculture and other in- 
dustrial subjects. Perhaps nothing more clearly 
shows the phenomenon of the action and reac- 
tion of legislation and public opinion than a 
recent and most significant movement indicating 
that the federal government, through Congress, 
is likely to become a large and direct influence 
upon the general educational system of this 
country, for there has been introduced in both 
the 59th Congress and the 60th Congress a 
number of bills providing for the promotion of 
instruction in agriculture, mechanic arts and 
domestic economy through federal aid. Unless 
one has given it some thought, he is in the habit 
of regarding federal legislation as having but a 
very remote relationship to the expansion and 
progress of education at large in the United 
States. It is time that our educators wake up 
to the fact that we are establishing precedents 
with reference to educational administration 
which may have an important bearing upon a 
national system of education. Unconsciously, 
but no less rapidly, we are moving toward a more 



PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE 19 

or less centralized government-al control of educa- 
tional institutions, for notwithstanding the ab- 
sence of direct federal participation in this con- 
trol, the sum of $14,500,000 annually paid from 
national appropriations for colleges of agricul- 
ture, mechanic arts, agricultural experiment sta- 
tions and for education in the District of 
Columbia seems to be a justification for regard- 
ing congressional action as an already active 
factor in the support and development of par- 
ticular and special educational activities of no 
small significance to the country as a whole. 
At the present time the U. S. Department of 
Agriculture is a more important educational 
factor than the U. S. Bureau of Education. 
Where it will end no one can predict. The hope- 
ful aspect of all this national and state agitation 
toward a movement for industrial and agricul- 
tural education is that it points out that educa- 
tion is not merely to be that which the local 
public sentiment of the present generation ap- 
parently wants, but that it is to be that which the 
oncoming generation will undoubtedly need. 
Evidently educational inertia in either munici- 
pality or state is not to be allowed to hinder 
national progress in agricultural and industrial 
development. 



20 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

A popular movement. 

The increasing interest in tlie subject of in- 
dustrial education has expressed itself in the 
editorial columns of the public press ; in state and 
local federations of women's clubs, and in 
national and state gatherings of teachers. New 
school buildings all over the country are being 
planned to provide space for shops and domestic 
science laboratories. The people of all com- 
munities through men's clubs, boards of trade, 
manufacturers ' associations and farmers ' granges 
have come together to consider the question. It 
is clearly evident to one who makes a broad sur- 
vey that the movement for this form of educa- 
tion is tremendously significant and that it means 
much more than would be conveyed by the mere 
titles. It would seen that apart from the direct 
question of establishing industrial and trades 
schools, the term *' industrial education" in the 
minds of the mass of our people simply means the 
redirecting of our public schools through recog- 
nizing that they must be adapted to the needs of 
our people and that their subject-matter must be 
taught with an economic, as well as a social pur- 
pose in mind. 

Evolution not revolution. 

In analyzing the arguments presented it is 
safe to say that the fundamental principles of 



PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE 21 

industrial education are in keeping with the prin- 
ciples of all effective education, which are in 
brief: that all effective teaching results from, 
develops out of or is connected with the experience 
of the child; that this experience should have 
relation to vocations or to the pupil's part in 
life; that every school should be the natural ex- 
pression of the life of its community. Moreover, 
industrial education used in its broadest sense is 
in no way antagonistic to the general function 
of all education which is to develop and train the 
mind. 

Present contentions. 

When it is first presented, no subject seems to 
lead to quite so much contention as industrial 
education. At the present time all are aroused 
over it and some are much disturbed. In gath- 
erings of educators we fiiid that apparently there 
are lacking clear definitions of the respective 
fields of ''handwork in public schools,'' ''indus- 
trial schools," "vocational schools" and "trade 
schools"; there is a confusion as to its content 
as to whether it includes agricultural, industrial 
and commercial training. In local communities 
there is a fear of making a beginning, the fact 
being lost sight of that the best in our educa- 
tion has developed out of pedagogical exiDcrience 
and not out of mere discussion. Discussions in 



22 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

public meetings develop questions as to the rela- 
tive attitudes of manufacturers, labor leaders and 
business men. In the council chambers of 
national leaders in education such questions arise 
as to whether industrial education shall be in the 
hands of our present state boards of education or 
regents, or in the hands of special boards or 
commissions; whether it is to be incorporated in 
special schools or in present existing schools; 
whether trade schools are to be supported by 
funds received from regular sources or from 
special sources. Where schools have been 
started, many points have to be considered, such 
as the question of making articles of marketable 
value; and, if so, whether they shall be sold; 
whether these schools shall cooperate with em- 
ployers through some half-time arrangements, etc. 
In fact, difficulties present themselves in a hun- 
dred ways and much honest difference of opinion 
exists. These and many other problems are fully 
discussed in the various chapters which follow. 

An earnest attempt. 

It would seem as though the reason for this 
honest variance of opinion was easily explained. 
Education is beginning to have a real meaning: 
it is beginning to teach subject-matter in terms 
of actual daily life. We are making our first 
serious attempt to meet, in any complete sense. 



PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE 23 

pressing economic, industrial and social problems. 
When we attempt to study the significance of 
industry upon the life of our people we find that 
the social and economic problems involved are 
exceedingly puzzling. In the past it was a com- 
paratively easy task to develop an educational 
scheme in accord with the ideal of Mill. But to- 
day we soon find that the moment we attempt to 
connect our schools with our industries and the 
vocations of our people we are confused by the 
demands made upon the schools. But we must 
not hesitate. 

A new conception. 

In America public education is a passion, and 
rightly so. We shall go forward in our attempt 
to adjust our schools to the needs of our chil- 
dren and our industries. But just how we shall 
do it is a problem. Many points must be con- 
sidered. We must know something of the signifi- 
cance of industry upon the life of our people, of 
the new position women are taking in the eco- 
nomic world, of the trades union movement, of 
the educational work now being organized under 
private initiative in factories and stores, and a 
score of subjects hitherto considered as being out- 
side of the province of teachers and school admin- 
istrators. 

It is a large matter and one of deep concern. 



24 THE WOEKER AND THE STATE 

It means much more expense for public educa- 
tion. It involves a new chapter in our educa- 
tional theory. It means a serious study of other 
educational systems. It suggests radical changes 
in schoolhouses and courses. It necessitates the 
training of a different class of teachers. Mean- 
while before that can be commenced, or while it is 
being done, there will be much breaking out of 
new roads, a consolidation of public sentiment, 
and new laws written upon the statute books. It 
is a movement full of promise, and some day in 
its fulfillment, unhampered by educational prec- 
edent or dogma, it will be possible for anyone to 
receive instruction in any subject at any time. 
Nothing less can be acceptable in an American 
democracy. 



II 



THE EDUCATIONAL SIGNIFICANCE OF 
MODERN INDUSTRY 

THE history of industry is the history of civ- 
ilization, and the progress of mankind is 
written in the history of its tools. In any study 
of industrial education a survey of industrial 
development is necessary. It is important to re- 
view the economic progress of a nation, passing 
as it has, from one stage of activity to another 
until at length it reaches the diversified and mul- 
titudinous complexity of toil of our present sys- 
tem of industry. Such a study should assist us 
in formulating a new conception of social and 
educational principles which will not be at variance 
with the newer laws of production, of distribu- 
tion and of consumption. 

Industrialism at every point. 

The work of the nameless digger of tunnels 
who turns his shovel of dirt under the direction 
of the mechanical engineer is an expression of 
human intellect and energy, as truly as any great 

25 



26 THE iWORKER AND THE STATE 

and delicate invention like the linotype machine, 
whose originator has made possible the dissem- 
ination of literature and records of human 
progress to all sorts and conditions of men. 
Our mechanical civilization presses upon us on 
all sides. In New York City one can arise in 
the morning in a house made from machine- 
pressed, concrete blocks ; take a bath from a sys- 
tem of waterworks which is a marvel of en- 
gineering, upon which a horde of immigrants 
was engaged; dress himself in a suit the coat of 
which alone had thirty-nine operations in its 
making ; wear a pair of shoes which involves 
over one hundred distinct manual operations 
and requires the use of forty-five different ma- 
chines in its making; eat a breakfast of beef- 
steak and thus closely touch an industry where 
division of labor has been ingeniously worked 
out in some thirty odd operations of killing and 
dressing a bullock; ride down to business on a 
subway train whose method of operation de- 
pends upon automatic switches, signals and 
speed control; read a paper with the world news 
as given by telephone, wireless telegraph, mes- 
senger boys, printers and typesetters — an indus- 
try reaching from the logging camps of Maine and 
the preparation of the wood pulp to the almost 
human action of the Hoe press; ride in an ex- 
press elevator to the thirty-fifth floor of his office 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 27 

building to dictate into a phonograph his orders 
of the day, that he may carry on the business of 
directing the human efforts of twenty-five thou- 
sand men and women who are working in a dis- 
tant city on a manufactured product. Whatever 
may be the usefulness of all the labor performed, 
it is certain that a vast expenditure of human 
energy was saved by the use of extra-human en- 
ergy in the shape of mechanical devices con- 
trolled by human intellects. 

Our slave or its slave. 

Now shall we be the slave of the machine or 
make it our slave? Its function is to minister to 
human needs and not to dominate or control 
them. Our problem is how to extend the use of 
mechanical appliances and natural forces to take 
the place of muscular energy in the performance 
of the world's drudgery without the attendant 
abuse — the past negligence of society in coun- 
teracting certain social conditions accompa- 
nying industrial developments. From this point 
of view we shall see that no sky-scraper, 
subway, or intricate machine can be said to rep- 
resent progress in a modem nation unless it 
means individual progress to the workers who 
made these things possible. We no longer ac- 
cept industrial evils as necessary. There is a 
growing consciousness among the mass of our 



28 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

people of their power to control their own condi- 
tions. 

Thurston says: ** Human progress depends 
upon the ability of mankind to do more work 
and to accomplish greater tasks; to supply the 
necessaries of life with less expenditure of time 
and strength and thus to secure leisure for 
thought, invention, and intellectual development 
of every kind." Along these lines a process of 
reconstruction of society is now going on, and an 
industrial democracy is the hope of the future. 
The movement is twofold: on one side an awak- 
ened people are forcing industrial issues on the 
national law-making bodies, and on the other, 
they are combining in voluntary associations to 
the end that better conditions of life and labor 
may be secured. 

We see that human needs are capable of in- 
finite multiplication and subdivision. They are 
never at rest but increase in degree and extent 
with the progress of civilization. The modern 
division of labor is ever forcing larger masses 
into a condition of dependence. The pressure 
of the means of production is making men's occu- 
pations increasingly dissimilar and at the same 
time it is making the men, as consumers, ever 
more alike. The manufactured products within 
our reach are the work of many heads and hands. 
Are we compensated by the variety of the articles 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 29 

that makes life richer in pleasures but poorer 
possibly in the personal equipment of the worker? 

Tremendous possibilities. 

In economic and social matters many people 
have very definite opinions on what should be, 
rather than on what is. Seeing that industry in an 
earlier shape was accompanied by more whole- 
some conditions than in its present form, they 
look upon handicraft as the normal form of in- 
dustry and ask themselves how that happy con- 
dition may be restored. But in our fast chang- 
ing present how can we strive after an ideal 
whose realization belongs to the past*? An op- 
posite point of view is that of those who believe 
that the modern system of production has with- 
in itself tremendous possibilities for social prog- 
ress if society, through public sentiment and leg- 
islation, will attempt to give the same proportion 
of brain and money to developing the best in civic 
life that is now provided by captains of industry 
for the means of factory production. 

We can hardly arrive at an understanding of 
the significance of industrial development and at 
ways and means of meeting some present prob- 
lems until we make a brief survey of the main 
systems of industry as they appeared in England 
and as they have taken shape in more recent years 
in our own country. Throughout such study 



30 THE WOEKER AND THE STATE 

one will see the rise of democracy througli a re- 
volt against the terrible conditions under which 
labor has worked and the gradually-increasing 
consciousness among the people of their power 
to remedy the evils which they themselves have 
unconsciously created. 

Main systems of industry. 

In historical succession there are five main 
systems of industry: first, housework (domestic 
work) ; second, wage work ; third, handicraft ; 
fourth, commission work (house industry) ; and 
fifth, factory work. It is an interesting devel- 
opment from the first system where the indus- 
trial production was in and for the house, from 
raw materials furnished by the household itself 
to the last system where the effective utilization 
of labor divides the processes of production into 
its simplest elements. In one case, as Biicher 
says, ^^All the household had, it owed to its own 
labor." In the other, as Spencer says, ^'Special- 
ization in industry arises from a desire on the 
part of an individual or group of individuals to 
exploit the remainder of society for profit.'' 

Have we industrial feudalism? 

To a certain degree there has always existed 
in society a desire on the part of a few to exploit 
for profit the labor of others. The lord of the 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 31 

manor in old England, surrounded by serfs de- 
pendent upon him and his land for their living, 
is not in an industrial sense different from the 
captain of industry with his factory system upon 
which the workers to-day are dependent for wages 
with which to buy food, clothing and shelter. 
In the first instance, it was practically impos- 
sible for the serf to lease the land from its owner ; 
he was tied industrially and politically. In the 
second instance, it is nearly as difficult to leave 
the factory, not because the worker is bound by 
the bonds of slavery, but because he cannot find 
elsewhere work which he is competent to do — 
and he cannot carry with him the machinery for 
doing it. A steel worker in Pittsburg is not free 
to ply his trade in Indianapolis; neither can a 
worker in electrical machinery find employment 
outside of Lynn, Schenectady, Chicago or Pitts- 
burg. The structural steel erector must go to 
Panama, to New York City, to Toronto and to 
other places where the work calls him. In the 
days of old, labor was bound to man and land; 
to-day it is bound to corporate interests and the 
factory. Yet we need not be pessimistic, for the 
greatest advance has been made in political and 
social freedom even while we drifted into indus- 
trial feudalism. From serfdom to freedom, 
from whip to ballot, from hovel to cottage, from 
ignorance to free schools, mark a progress 



32 THE AVORKER AND THE STATE 

which should give us hope and courage for fur- 
ther effort. 

Housework stage. 

In the days of William the Conqueror each of 
the villages was a self-sufficing, economic unit, 
the inhabitants obtaining their food and cloth- 
ing from their own flocks and herds and from 
their own land. It was essentially the house- 
work stage of industry. Only the simplest arts 
and domestic manufactures were carried on by 
the people at large, such as the crafts of the 
ironworker and coppersmith, the shoemaker and 
the carpenter. At this time there was no circu- 
lation of goods nor capital. There rested upon 
each household the necessity to satisfy by its 
own labor, the wants of its members. Its wealth 
consisted entirely in goods for consumption in 
various stages of completion, such as cereals, 
flax, yarn and cloth. It also possessed auxil- 
iary means of production, such as a handmill, ax 
and hand loom. 

Beginning of the ivage system. 

During the reign of Henry III a remarkable 
change began to affect the condition of serfs and 
laborers, for the lords were so willing to accept 
money instead of labor that a dependent could 
buy off his service. With this freedom a spirit 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 33 

of independence began to evince itself as there 
grew a consciousness of the power of individual 
labor and its value in the economic life of the 
nation. There arose an independent class of in- 
dustrial workers, marking the beginning of the 
wage system. The worker had, of course, only 
simple tools and, on account of his lack of busi- 
ness capital, was obliged to work on the raw 
material furnished by its producer, who also 
consumed the finished product. 

The guild movement. 

Next we have the handicraft stage of industry, 
for the towns had been growing in importance, 
gaining fresh privileges through the granting 
of charters and had become quite independent of 
the lord. They had grown from mere trading 
centers into seats of specialized industries, reg- 
ulated and organized by the craft guilds. The 
guild movement produced greater unity and co- 
hesion among the townsmen and awakened in 
the workers the idea of corporate unity of munic- 
ipal and industrial life. Each organization 
tried to secure good work oh the part of its 
members and attempted to suppress the produc- 
tion of wares by irresponsible persons who 
were not members of the craft. The instinct of 
trade unionism had begun to develop. It was 
ruled that members must work not merely for 



84 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

their own private advantage, but for the repu- 
tation and good of their trade. The guild also 
trained a limited number of young people in its 
particular industry so as to secure a supply of 
competent workmen for the future. In this way 
there arose the system of each master workman 
having apprentices. 

The distinction between the laborers of this 
period and those of to-day lies in the fact that 
each worked not for a single employer but for a 
large number of consumers. These workmen 
were handicraftsmen and were distinguished 
from the factory workers who followed by the fact 
that they possessed all the means of production 
and sold for a definite price the finished articles 
which were the product of their own labor and 
their own raw material, while the factory worker 
merely received a recompense for his labor. 
Essentially the system was one of custom pro- 
duction, the customer buying at first hand and 
the handicraftsman selling to the actual con- 
sumer. Contrasted with the present system the 
producer felt personal responsibility in the pres- 
ence of the consumer. 

Commission system starts. 

At the close of the Middle Ages one finds that 
the old manorial land system was dying out. 
Industry had outgrown the bounds of field and 



BmNIFlCANCE OF INDUSTRY S5 

household. England had developed from a wool 
exporting into a wool manufacturing country. 
Cloth manufacture was beginning to fall into 
the power of capitalist employers. This was the 
beginning of the commission system, for while 
the day of the factory had not yet arrived it was 
the practice in the sixteenth century for master 
manufacturers to employ a number of men 
working at looms, either in their own homes or 
under the master's control. This beginning of 
what, later on, was to be the factory system of 
production, did not commend itself to the states- 
men of Queen Mary's time, for we find that an 
Act was passed stating that ^^no persons using 
the feat or mystery of cloth making shall retain 
or have in their homes and possession any more 
than one woolen loom at a time." The pream- 
ble to the act has a familiar and modern ring: 
' ' The rich and wealthy clothiers do in many ways 
oppress the weavers ... by giving much 
less wages and hire than in times past . . . 
by letting out the looms at unreasonable rents 
. . . by setting up looms for unskilled work- 
ers and thus bringing to decay a great number 
of artificers which were brought up in said 
science." 

Work was carried on by the artisan in his little 
stone house, the wool was carded and spun by 
his wife and daughters and the cloth was woven 



36 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

by himself and his sons. The workman was not 
merely a unit among hundreds of unknown 
hands. The absence of machinery kept em- 
ployers and workmen more upon a common 
level. Village life combined agricultural with 
industrial occupations. Entering one of the 
cottages one would find the master of the house 
sitting at the loom ; his daughter at the spinning 
wheel; the wife at her domestic duties and per- 
haps one of the sons working in the garden plot 
which produced their chief articles of food. So 
it is seen that under the domestic or commission 
system there was some division of work. The 
capitalist has not stood alone in his exploita- 
tion of labor, for the master of the house saw 
the economic benefit of working his family. The 
commission system had its advantages, for it 
drew loosely together a large number of homo- 
geneous laborers, imparted to their production a 
definite direction, approximately the same for 
each and caused the product of their labor to flow 
to a common point before distributing it in all 
directions. It left the existing method of pro- 
duction quite undisturbed and merely confined 
itself entirely to organizing the market. The 
capitalist at this time was an ^^entrepreneur'' 
who regularly employed these people in their own 
homes away from his own place of business. 
They were either former handicraftsmen who 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 37 

now produced for a single tradesman instead of 
for a number of consumers, or former wage 
workers who now received their raw material not 
from the consumer but from the merchant. In 
this manner simply and naturally the commission 
system grew out of the wage-working and handi- 
craft systems. We shall see how easy it was to 
take the next step — the development of the 
factory system. 

Coming of the industrial revolution. 

We have reached the time of the great indus- 
trial revolution. It is a turning point in English 
industrial history — the time when machinery 
began to displace unaided manual labor. Hither- 
to industry had been carried on by numbers 
of small capitalists who were also manual work- 
men even when they employed other workmen 
under them. Meanwhile, there had been evolved 
a larger class than ever of people who were en- 
tirely dependent upon wages with no land of their 
own to fall back upon and consequently compelled 
to take what they could get from the nearest em- 
ployer. 

We are accustomed to emphasize the irapor- 
tance of the French Eevolution. But during the 
same period there was a revolution in industry 
not less serious which brought to England great 
misery as well as great economic advantage. 



38 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

The whirl and rattle of macliinery and the mighty 
hiss of steam were to make the country for bet- 
ter or for worse, a battleground of a new era in 
production — an era of concentrated population, of 
competitive labor, of child labor, of unsanitary 
conditions in home and factory, and finally of 
what in modern times is known as the '* exploi- 
tation of labor." 

Dependence upon the capitalist. 

The capitalist now occupied the center of the 
stage. The workers began to feel the difference 
between the old system and the new. The new 
system made them dependent upon the mill owner 
where formerly they bought for themselves the 
yarn they were to weave. Moreover, a concen- 
tration of population took place. The working 
classes Jost that rural character which had distin- 
guished the domestic system of industry. Now 
they had to live close by the factory. For ob- 
vious reasons, steam could only be generated in 
a fixed spot and the resulting motive power could 
only be distributed over a small area, and so it 
became necessary to have all working people close 
together in one large building. The artisan was 
now confined strictly to the factory and the agri- 
culturist strictly to the fields. There was no 
overlapping of emjoloyments. The woman at 
home no longer found a buyer for her homespun 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 39 

yarn and conversely the artisan no longer sup- 
plemented his earnings by working in the field. 
The income of the artisan or the agriculturist 
was limited to the earnings of either the mill or 
farm. 

A record of misery. 

The Industrial Eevolution, no less than the 
French Eevolution, had its deeds marked in blood. 
It was a record of cruelty and misery. The low 
wages paid the adult workers forced the entrance 
of young children in the mills. When the supply 
of these children ran short not a few of the mill 
owners sought the workhouses and under the 
pretense of ^'apprenticing" pauper children, se- 
cured cheap labor under conditions which made it 
nothing more or less than child slave labor. The 
hours of labor of these children were limited only 
by exhaustion. They were fed upon cheap and 
coarse food, slept on the floor in dirty hovels, 
worked sixteen hours a day in heated and ill- 
ventilated workrooms and were prodded with 
sticks or lashed with a whip if they dropped from 
exhaustion. Filth, rags and poverty under the 
factory system took the place of the neatness, 
cleanliness and comfort of the cottage under the 
domestic system. Not only were the factory 
methods revolutionary, but also the social life of 
the majority of the producers of the nation 



40 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

changed, due to the concentration of popula- 
tion in large towns where the mill hand spent 
his life amid surroundings of repulsive ugliness 
and engaged in an occupation of wearisome 
monotony. Terrible epidemics caused by over- 
work, scanty food and overcrowding, broke out. 

Agitation begins. 

The crowding of large bodies of people together 
resulted in a rapid spread of new ideas, new po- 
litical enthusiasms and social activities. It re- 
sulted in dissociating the workers from their em- 
ployers and aroused a spirit of antagonism which 
is inevitable when both parties fail to recognize 
the essential identity of their interests. Agita- 
tion for reform appeared and something had to 
be done. Capitalistic greed rose up in all its 
power to block the path of reform. Laws passed 
in 1802 to remedy conditions became a dead letter. 
The opposition used the now time-worn argu- 
ments that profits were impossible if hours were 
reduced; that overpowering competition from 
foreign countries would result if hours and 
wages were changed ; and urged the grave danger 
of governmental interference. Nevertheless, the 
workmen cried out for the restriction of child 
labor to ten hours a day; for the prohibition of 
night work to persons under eighteen years of 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 41 

age; for compulsory school attendance; and the 
appointment of factory inspectors. 

A voice of protest. 

More and more those who have the welfare of 
workers at heart will turn to the life and work 
of Eobert Owen for inspiration. He was the 
great and revered friend of the toilers of the world, 
who in 1815 lifted his voice in public protest 
against the iniquities of the industrial system. 
With him, interference was not a question of 
economic theory, but one of human life. It was 
about this time that a committee from the House 
of Commons reported that ^^no interference of 
the Legislature with the freedom of trade or with 
the perfect liberty of every individual to dispose 
of his time or labor in the way and on the terms 
which he may judge most conducive to his inter- 
est, can take place without violating general 
principles of first importance to the community, 
without establishing precedents . . ." But 
the tide had set toward better labor conditions 
in spite of the manufacturers who were anxious 
enough to use the strong arm of the law in their 
own interests. His bill of 1819 was certainly the 
first expression of the new doctrine that the state 
ought to protect the interests of its weaker citi- 
zens. From that day to this the advance of the 



42 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

interests of workers has been on that basis and it 
has its application to-day in matters of educa- 
tional and social progress. Of course his policy 
met with opposition. It was * legislative inter- 
ference between the free laborer and his em- 
ployer,'' and a ''violent, highly-dangerous and un- 
constitutional innovation.'' In brief, his line of 
action was based upon, three propositions : first, to 
prevent children from being employed in cotton or 
other mills of machinery until they were twelve 
years old ; second, that the hours of work in mills 
of machinery should not exceed twelve per day, 
including one hour and a half for meals and rec- 
reation ; third, that, after a period to be fixed, no 
child should be received in a mill of machinery 
until he should have been taught to read, to write 
a legible hand and to understand the first four 
rules of arithmetic; and the girls, in addition, to 
be taught to sew their common articles of cloth- 
ing. 

We may well note that with a change in years 
from twelve to sixteen, a change of hours from 
twelve to eight, and a change of the three R's 
to the three H's (head, heart and hands) this 
bill might well find at the present time a new 
sponsor. Thus does a new era bring forth new 
conditions and new needs= 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 43 

A process of adaptation, 

Eeserving until later any suggestions as to the 
part tliat society has played, and may continue 
to play, in relieving the conditions of the indi- 
vidual workers, we must give some attention to 
the various economic advantages of the new sys- 
tem of production. After all, the various systems 
of industry which have been described are noth- 
ing but processes of adaptation that play so great 
a part in the evolutionary history of the world. 
The tools have seemed to fit the man all through 
the history of the race. The processes of pro- 
duction have served to adapt the tasks of human 
labor to the variety of human power and ability, 
with a consequent adaptation of individual powers 
to the tasks to be performed. From a disorgan- 
ized system of production, suitable to the time, 
no doubt, the housework form of industry has 
grown into the factory system, — one which has 
organized the whole process of production. As 
Carl Biicher writes, ^*It unites various kinds of 
workers, by mutual relations of control and sub- 
jection, into a compact and well-disciplined body, 
brings them together in a special business estab- 
lishment, provides them with an extensive and 
complex outfit of the machinery of production and 
thereby immensely increases their productive 
power." 



44 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

Secret of the factory's strength. 

The secret of the factory's strength as an insti- 
tution for production thus lies in the effective 
utilization of labor. It accomplishes this by the 
principle of the division of labor. This principle 
is not new. It existed when the male member of 
the tribe decided that he could do better by hunt- 
ing and fighting than he could by drawing water 
and hewing wood, and so left the woman at home 
to attend to the home activities. Few things are 
new in the world but they have new applications 
and new motives. The motive of the Indian 
sprang from personal inclination — that of the 
manufacturer from getting the world's work done. 

In order to accomplish the most effective utili- 
zation of labor all the work necessary to a process 
of production is first divided into its simplest 
elements. This division of elements may be illus- 
trated in the production of shoes. In the first 
place, we have the allied industries of preparation 
of leather, last making, the manufacture of shoe 
fixings and shoe machinery. Each of these in- 
dustries is then subdivided — for instance, in 
assembling the shoe proper we have the depart- 
ments of cutting, stitching, bottoming and finish- 
ing. Again these departments are subdivided, as, 
for example, in the bottoming department there 
is welt sewing, sole laying, rounding, channeling, 
heeling and a score of other operations. 



SIGNIFICANCE OP INDUSTRY 45 

Every factor utilized. 

In this way the work of production is sepa- 
rated into the difficult and the easy, the mechan- 
ical and the intellectual, the skilled and the crude. 
It utilizes every kind of endowment. It avoids 
every waste of strength. It unites handwork and 
head work. It demands great muscular power 
along with those operations in which suppleness 
of the finger, delicacy of touch, keenness of sight 
come in question. It requires, on the one hand, 
a skill gained through theory and practice, and 
on the other hand, those who have never done a 
day's work in the shoe factory can find a place 
to work. In early times when these different 
tasks were placed on one worker a great waste of 
skilled labor resulted, for the productive portion 
of the population was limited to those who had 
mastered some one branch of technique in all its 
parts. But now by separating the qualitatively 
unequal labor elements from one another, divi- 
sion of labor succeeds in utilizing the weakest as 
well as the strongest workers and in inciting them 
to the development of the highest special skill. 

A mighty increase in volume. 

The restriction of each individual to a small 
section of the laboring process effects a mighty 
increase in the volume of work turned out, for a 
hundred workmen in a factory accomplish in a 



46 THE WOEKEB AND THE STATE 

given process of production more than a hundred 
independent mastercraftsmen, although each of 
the latter understands the whole process while 
none of the former understands more than a 
small portion of it. As an illustration of this 
principle, Carroll D. Wright once compared the 
number of workmen employed, operations per- 
formed, hours of labor and cost of labor, in man- 
ufacturing a hundred pairs of men's medium 
grade, calf, welt, lace shoes, single soles and soft 
box toes, in 1863 and 1895. His results showed 
that in 1863 manufacturing these one hundred 
pairs of shoes by hand necessitated seventy-three 
operations by one workman, with approximately 
1831 hours of work, at a labor cost of about $458. 
To make the same number of shoes of similar 
grade in 1895 by machine there were 173 opera- 
tions, 371 workmen, the time being approximately 
234 hours and the cost of labor $60. 

Differentiation of labor. 

In general, it may be said that the factory sys- 
tem, with its division of labor, has come into be- 
ing like other great movements as a natural out- 
growth of human needs and conditions. It is a 
process by which a task is transferred from the 
one person hitherto performing it to several per- 
sons, the transfer being so made that each of 
these performs but a separate part of the pre- 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 47 

vious total labor. Division of labor will always 
be characterized by an increase in the number 
of laborers necessary for the accomplishment of 
.a definite economic end and at the same time by 
a differentiation of work. In brief, the economic 
tasks become simplified, better adapted to limited 
human capacities; they become, as it were, indi- 
vidualized. 

Where have ive erred? 

There is a general impression that the so-called 
machine age which is responsible for our system 
of intensified production is degrading and debas- 
ing to the worker rather than helpful. It is gen- 
erally believed that division of labor, automatic 
machinery and the piece-work system is the cause 
of much of the degradation in our large manu- 
facturing centers. It is not to be denied that 
poverty, viciousness, tuberculosis, crowded tene- 
ments and other dangers to public welfare are 
found in these centers. An ill-ventilated and 
dimly-lighted textile mill seems to be associated 
with endless rows of dirty, ill-kept tenements. In 
the mind of one observer these conditions are the 
result of the system of manufacture; but an- 
other observer in a shoe city where there may be 
even greater specialization and subdivision of 
labor may find that these factories are light and 
airy, provided with improved sanitary facilities, 



48 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

have rest and lunch rooms, and that surrounding 
the factory are cottage houses with well-kept 
lawns and the material appearances of taste and 
refinement. A state that legislates in the inter- 
ests of the health and safety of its workers, an 
employer who obeys willingly the factory laws, 
a workman with intelligence and skill, a wage 
scale that is commensurate with work done, a cot- 
tage with well-kept lawn and a happy family, may 
well go together without any reference to the 
question of automatic machinery or division of 
labor. It is a fact that several cities having fac- 
tories which have carried the science of produc- 
tion to the very limit of its possibilities are more 
representative of what is best in civic life than 
others which have factories where the processes 
are manual and individual. Only the greatest of 
harm can come in ascribing the bad conditions of 
life in manufacturing cities to the division of 
labor principle. These conditions exist in spite 
of the automatic machine. This same machine 
has within itself an escape from the lower to the 
higher life as has the city in which it is located. 
The problem, in common with many others, is one 
of education, depending for its solution upon 
a knowledge not only of the benefits of the in- 
dustrial development, as outlined, but a knowl- 
edge of ways and means of eradicating the evils 
which seem to accompany it. Society has gained 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 49 

much by its system of production, but it cannot 
get something for nothing any more than can the 
individual. The problem of life is to preserve 
all that is good in any movement or expression 
and to discover reagents which will clear the solu- 
tion in the social test tube. 

The point of attack. 

The point of attack is with the individual 
worker, his education, his home and his civic re- 
sponsibility. The industrial system has already 
done much for him. To many the automatic ma- 
chine is a godsend, for it has taken those of a 
lower order and placed them under different and 
better conditions than before. The operator of 
the automatic screw machine is a new species of 
workman, evolved and advanced from a lower 
class of skill or from a class that has hitherto had 
no opportunity to develop skill ; for out of a mass 
of immigrants, ignorant and clumsy, the system 
is making a race of factory workers. Through 
a greater cunning of hand and a higher standard 
of living than they ever had before, their minds 
have been called upon to act. In this way the 
factory may become a training ground for making 
over laborers of low grade into workers of 
higher character and greater social efficiency. 
But as has already been hinted, it is a problem 
of education. Never before in all the history of 



50 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

the world has such a mass of unskilled workers 
had an opportunity of labor under conditions that 
can be made favorable. Ditch digging requires 
no great mental effort and reacts in no favorable 
way on the worker. It is simply hard work — 
yet it is individual in its action and requires no 
machinery. It ought to satisfy those who be- 
lieve in a return to hand labor. But the same 
worker may enter a factory and run an auto- 
matic machine under modern factory laws, with 
a decent living wage and a fair opportunity for 
self -improvement for himself and his children — 
and we have our citizen of an industrial democ- 
racy ! 

The gate of opportunity. 

It has been said that the automatic machine 
has all the brain and the worker has none. This 
is a fallacy, for the breath of life has never been 
breathed into the machine. It is likely any mo- 
ment to cease to be automatic, and at that moment 
it requires a brain to adjust it. It needs a drop 
of oil or the tightening of a nut, and the operative, 
so recently removed from the ditch, may perform 
this service, slight in itself, yet so productive of 
benefit to him if he but exercise a bit of skill and 
intelligence. At this moment he is on the road 
to becoming a thinking being and the gate of op- 
portunity (for the American system of factory 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 51 

organization is open at the top) opens to liim. 
This country does not and should not have hori- 
zontal industrial and social stratification. Let 
the poorest and meanest of operators but think 
and act and for him advancement begins, provided 
the community provides the opportunity for it. 
Moreover, the relation of the total demand to 
the mass of raw material capable of profitable 
utilization becomes even more unfavorable with 
the increase in the number of human beings 
needing products. Not only is this material lim- 
ited but the human labor which invests it with the 
qualities of a marketable ware and increases its 
quantity is also limited. The share in head work 
falling to each one engaged in the undertaking of 
making these products would become at length in- 
tolerable were it not possible to reduce it through 
an economic employment of labor and the worker 
would not have any mental strength left to apply 
to his self -improvement. If every factory worker 
was obliged to do, even if he could, as much think- 
ing as those who are responsible for the whole 
process of production, he would find himself at 
the end of the day in a network of mental snarls. 

Avoiding wasted energy. 

Again, if a product were made by one man it 
would mean that he would have to execute a fre- 
quent change of motions .and with every such 



52 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

change there would come a waste of energy ; for 
passing from one kind of movement to another 
calls for mental and bodily accommodation to 
the new class of work, which means an outlay of 
strength yielding in itself no useful return. 
With muscular actions pursuing a uniform move- 
ment, however, the mind's share in the work can 
be somewhat eliminated and an automatic per- 
formance of those movements soon enters which, 
with increasing practice, removes farther and far- 
ther the limits of fatigue. At the same time the 
intensity of automatic labor can be greatly in- 
creased, so that not only can the movements be 
continued longer, but a larger number of them is 
possible within a given unit of time. Of course 
this sort of work breeds monotony but we have 
work that must be done and the quicker it is out 
of the way the more time there should be for 
wholesome recreation and self-improvement. 

Already intensified production has been accom- 
panied by a reduction in the number of hours of 
labor. One is, or should be, the direct cause of 
the other. These shortened hours should mean 
time for family life, social enjoyment and self- 
improvement. They should emancipate the 
worker from excessive fatigue of mind and body, 
leaving the way open for the attainment of tech- 
nical knowledge and personal culture. We must 
remember that every operative is just as much 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 53 

a man as any professional man ; he has a body to 
feed and clothe and a mind to be developed in some 
direction. His tendencies are upward or down- 
ward, as with every other man. Now, what is 
society doing for these people? 

Development of social conscience. 

A piece of steel may be forged into a sword or 
a ploughshare; its form depends upon the idea 
of the artisan. The kernel of corn may nourish 
as food or be turned into a drink to poison the 
souls of men ; its use depends upon the idea of the 
cultivator. Every product, every tool, has its 
uses and abuses. Both depend on the standards 
of society and whether the nation has devel- 
oped a social conscience. May not the automatic 
machine serve the interests of community and at 
the same time best serve the interests of the op- 
erative ? 

In itself the introduction of the automatic ma- 
chine with its intricate movements is no cause 
for alarm, but the use to which we are putting 
some of its products and the way in which society 
is treating its operatives may be of deep concern. 
The sewing machine is not to blame for the sweat 
shop, the existence of forty-nine-cent shirtwaists 
or the sign boards advertising them. Whether we 
use or abuse the machine is a question of educa- 
tion; not necessarily industrial education or so- 



54 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

cial education or cultural education, but rather a 
democratic educational movement working to- 
wards the development of thinking and working 
members of an industrial democracy. Long ago, 
it seems, Euskin gave us the word: **We are 
always in these days endeavoring to separate in- 
tellect and manual labor ; we want one man to be 
always thinking and another to be always work- 
ing, and we call one a gentleman and the other 
an operative ; whereas the workman ought often 
to be thinking, and the thinker often to be work- 
ing, and both should be gentlemen in the best 
sense. ' ' 

Pay hack to the workers. 

We have seen how the workers were freed from 
serfdom by the beginnings of the wage system; 
how trade unions arose from the guild system; 
how the factory laws have been made more reason- 
able and how the modern system of production 
has spelled opportunity to the Pole, the Slav and 
the Greek. We have free schools, free press, 
free libraries, free art museums and public parks 
provided by and supported from public funds 
raised by a direct tax upon the selfsame indus- 
trial system whose development we have been 
studying. Society must return to the workers 
what it has received from their hands. Such a 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 55 

burden is supposed to lie primarily with, the pub- 
lic school, but there is need of securing the coop- 
eration of churches, clubs, betterment organiza- 
tions, park boards and other municipal and 
private associations. The popular conception of 
education is ever expanding and the schools are 
taking upon themselves or having thrust upon 
them, new duties, and it is the duty of social, 
civic and religious bodies to see that the schools 
have the intelligent backing of the community. 

Relation of the worker to the whole. 

Now just what may the school do to assist in 
solving some of the social and industrial prob- 
lems which have necessarily arisen in the modern 
system of production! In the first place the 
school must demonstrate the social necessity 
of each worker's task by showing him the 
intimate relation of his personal toil to all 
other great expressions of human activity. 
Feeding a machine with a material of which he 
has no knowledge, producing a product totally 
unrelated to the rest of his life, without in the 
least knowing what becomes of it is unquestion- 
ably deadening to his intellectual and moral life. 
If the shop constantly tends to make him a spe- 
cialist then the school must offset the over-special- 
ization of his daily work, either by preparatory 



56 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

industrial training previous to his entering the 
industry or supplemental training after his en- 
trance. 

Economic basis for culture. 

In the second place, the school must give some 
phase of effective education which will make it 
possible for our industrial workers to enjoy the 
benefits of a cultural education by providing 
means for it to rest upon an economic basis. 
Nicholas Murray Butler, President of Columbia 
University, has stated this point clearly: ^^It 
willbe a grave error to set vocational training 
and liberal training in sharp antagonism to each 
other. The purpose of the former is to pave the 
way to some appreciation of the latter and to pro- 
vide an economic base for it to rest upon. The 
equally grave error of the past has been to frame 
a course of study on the hypothesis that every 
pupil was to go forward in the most deliberate 
arnd amplest fashion to the study of the products 
of the intellectual life regardless of the basis of 
the economic support. ' ' 

Industrial freedom. 

In the third place, the school must provide vo- 
cational training that will make for the young 
worker's promotion after he has started on his 
industrial career. As a matter of fact, we have 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 57 

been fitting boys and girls for the factory by fail- 
ing to fit them to do anything else — a harsh state- 
ment, but, nevertheless, true. We have been 
saying, as did J. S. Mill in 1867, ^'Education 
makes a man a more intelligent shoemaker, if that 
be his occupation, not by teaching him how to 
make shoes; it does so by the mental exercise it 
gives and the habits it impresses.'' Under such 
a scheme the school was not to attempt to make 
this man a workman at all, it being assumed that 
at some time, somewhere and by somebody he was 
to be taught to make shoes. Consequently, by 
such an educational system the boy or girl has 
been qualified on leaving his first school to do but 
two things — either to go to a higher school or to 
go to work as an unskilled operative. 

No one can have any objections to the boy's 
starting his industrial career by working on an 
automatic machine. The crime committed by so- 
ciety has been in sentencing the boy to that ma- 
chine because educational facilities have failed to 
provide mechanical drawing, manual training, 
elementary mechanics and industrial intelligence 
that would assist him to advance after he started 
on the machine. Educators have been so fearful 
of fitting for the factory that they have in reality 
played right into the hands of modern methods 
of production at the expense of our industrial 
workers and to the detriment of society. 



58 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

Offsetting the monotony. 

In the fourth place, school authorities must 
have a new conception of educational values. 
Education is not merely a matter of thirty-eight 
weeks a year, five days in the week and five hours 
a day; it is rather a question of lifetime, of per- 
fecting the human spirit. The man who toils 
needs skill of hand directed by intelligent ef- 
fort. These qualities can be learned in school 
and reinforced by actual factory experience, but 
he needs more than that. Schools and other so- 
cial agencies must provide, through supplemental 
education, means of bringing variety and breadth 
of human experience to offset the monotony of toil. 
A broader social life must come with the nar- 
rower industrial life. The industrial efficiency 
of those who toil is not merely a question of 
school-shops, half-time schools and evening trade 
schools, but it depends as much, if not more, upon 
wholesome recreation, higher ideals, better homes, 
more effective use of libraries, schools, churches 
and clubs. 

Standing for the best. 

As a nation, we have not learned how to play. 
Only recently have we organized the play in- 
stinct of the child into our educational program. 
The time is not far distant when we shall recog- 
nize that wholesome recreation of our workers 



SIGNIFICANCE OF INDUSTRY 59 

has its value in industrial efficiency. At that 
time the high school buildings with their gymna- 
siums will not be idle for 180 days in the year, 
their lecture halls will no longer be silent and 
their field of knowledge, vocational and avoca- 
tional, will be limited no longer to those who are 
taking the '^ prescribed course of study." 

Society has delivered one of its greatest as- 
sets to human progress, the furnishing of amuse- 
ment, over to private enterprise. Recreation 
has been separated from instruction, and enter- 
tainment often stands apart from personal im- 
provement. We complain of the division of labor 
that has taken place in the factory. Do we ever 
think of the division of responsibility which has 
taken place in society? Productive labor is de- 
tached from the home and the school; formal ed- 
ucation stands aloof from present social prob- 
lems; the home has reduced its activities to 
feeding, clothing and sheltering, while private ven- 
tures furnish amusements and recreations. Some 
more sane and helpful adjustment of all these 
activities is possible in the social organism. 
Municipalities have their responsibilities and 
civic authorities must not shirk them. Society 
has received many benefits from the increased 
production due to the modern factory methods. 
It has made possible the creation of enormous 
wealth which exhibits itself in our churches, 



60 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

schools, streets, parks and libraries. These in- 
stitutions must give back to the workers what 
they have received from the machines. Nothing 
else is possible in an industrial democracy. A 
social consciousness is arising among our people 
that they have in their hands the making of men 
as well as the making of machines. Every man's 
work is worthy of a special preparation, both in 
an industrial and social sense. 



Ill 

WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 

THE peculiarly difficult problem in the voca- 
tional education of girls arises from the 
fact that almost all women will and must, in the 
nature of the case, prepare for various classes of 
vocations. The average American girl under 
present social conditions must serve a part of her 
life as a wage earner and the major portion of 
her life as a homemaker. To-day a large ma- 
jority of American girls are wage earners from 
fifteen or sixteen to perhaps twenty or twenty- 
one years of age, after which they undertake 
homemaking as a career. If they enter upon the 
wage-earning occupations with no preparation 
they are destined to have low wages and incur 
the danger of being exploited. If they enter 
upon the subsequent vocation of homemaking 
without preparation the conditions are disastrous 
to health and to the home. 

Two classes of vocations. 

Vocational education for girls is no less nec- 
essary in modern society than vocational edu- 

61 



62 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

cation for boys. All women in civilized society 
should be workers and producers, and in order 
that they may work and produce well they should 
have training along the lines of their aptitudes 
and probable fields of vocational effort. When 
it is said that all women should be workers and 
producers, it is of course understood that the 
largest single vocation for women is that of home- 
making, with all that it implies. Consequently, 
vocations for women may be divided into two 
classes, the homemaking and the wage-earning. 

Women have always loorlied. 

It is popularly assumed that the presence of 
women in industrial life is a new phenomenon. 
But, a careful study of their work from early 
times will show that women have always had 
their part in productive labor. The different 
conditions of home and industrial life have 
brought about a change in the kind of work that 
women do, but not necessarily any change in the 
amount and intensity. In early colonial days the 
woman spun the flax and wove the cloth; now 
she tends the loom in the mill. Then she made 
the family soap ; now she wraps and packs it in a 
factory. In many cases she has simply accom- 
panied her industry in its development, in others 
she has exchanged it for another form. 

The past two hundred years have seen a most 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 63 

interesting development of the economic position 
of women. In the early days of the eighteenth 
centnry the primary interests of our people were 
agriculture and commerce. Agricultural work was 
generally done by men. Women for the most part 
were engaged in the domestic cares of the house- 
hold, which included at that time the manufac- 
ture within the home of a large proportion of the 
articles needed for household use. 

At this period the keeping of the home was a 
science and an art, although neither consciously. 
It involved the grinding of corn and the baking 
of bread ; the carding of the wool and the making 
of the homespun garments; the raising of geese 
and the making of feather beds. Spinning and 
weaving, the processes upon which the making of 
cloth depended, absorbed a great deal of the time 
of the women and girls of the early colonial 
period. At first the raw materials were furnished 
by the household and used in the same household. 
Later some women spun the yarn only, sold or 
bartered it to the middle men who put it out again 
to be woven, and then sold the cloth. 

The colonial attitude towards woman's work 
was one of rigid insistence that they be busily 
employed in these home industries. The court 
orders and laws had in them the spirit of a Pu- 
ritan belief in the virtue of industry and self-sup- 
port. 



64 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

Begin to work in the factory. 

After the invention of the steam engine there 
began the revolution of industrial processes. 
Machines for carding and spinning were invented. 
Some factories were equipped only with looms 
while others carried on all the processes of cloth 
making. Many women still did mnch of the work 
at home, having their materials furnished by a 
manufacturer, to whom they returned the prod- 
uct when finished. It is to be noted that these 
women were taking over no new employment but 
that the manner of carrying on the old had been 
changed. Besides, the work which women had 
been doing in the home could be done more ef- 
fectually outside of the home. 

As the power loom and the flying shuttle re- 
quired less physical strength than hand machines, 
women began to displace men as weavers in the 
mills and to some extent dropped the work of 
carding, spinning and weaving by hand. The 
earliest factories did not open any new occupa- 
tions to women. The establishment of the fac- 
tory system simply meant the creation of a larger 
amount of work which took the 'women from 
the home. 

It is interesting to note that the cotton mills 
of New England employed in the early days 
young women of character and ability from na- 
tive stock ; many of them were saving their earn- 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 65 

ings to enter the female seminaries of the day, 
or to pay off a mortgage on the paternal farm. 
In fact, to large numbers of earnest New England 
girls, the cotton mill of 1840 spelled opportu- 
nity. While the sanitary conditions, both in the 
mills and in the boarding houses, were far from 
satisfactory, the girls stayed so short a time and 
brought such good constitutions from the farms 
that they seemingly escaped ill health. 

Eventually the opening of occupations for edu- 
cated women meant their withdrawal from me- 
chanical employments of a lower grade. The 
establishment of state normal schools in Massa- 
chusetts and the increasing demand for female 
teachers started an outward movement of New 
England women into a new profession. 

Past and present. 

The textile centers of present New England 
impress the visitor with a marked change in the 
character of the mill help. The gentlewomen 
are gone and in their places are immigrant opera- 
tives, to whom the factory system is as much of 
a relief from drudgery on foreign soil as was the 
early cotton mill to the Lowell or Fall River 
girl. There is at least one marked improvement. 
The advent of a fairly permanent body of factory 
operatives has brought about an improvement in 
working conditions which did not especially in- 



66 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

terest the former workers, who were there for a 
brief term of service. It is now recognized that 
large numbers of people will always live and 
work in the factories ; consequently, there are im- 
proved ventilation, shorter hours of labor, pro- 
tected machinery and improved sanitary con- 
ditions. 

The early fear of the Puritans was that single 
women would grow up in idleness. The conse- 
quences of idle living and the virtue of industry 
were the cry of the public moralist. Thus the 
seed of early preachments was sown; now, in- 
dustry and society are reaping the harvest. The 
call of the factory for help was welcomed as a 
means of enriching the community wealth. 
Women became an indispensable factor in the fac- 
tory system. It is too late to look upon them as 
entering a field of employment in which they have 
no right. The shifting of home activities, com- 
munity interests, family greed and even court 
orders have all had their share in forcing them 
into the factory; consequently any theory that 
women are a new element in our industrial life is 
a theory unsupported by facts. 

An entering wedge. 

The present status of women in industry under 
the competitive organization of industry presents 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 67 

a problem which is complicated in a great variety 
of ways. They have pushed past the traditional 
activities of home duties. They represent an 
entering wedge of a new and changing industrial 
order in which an increasing share of the efforts 
of factory production will be expended by women. 
Their entrance into the constructive industries 
complicates every industrial question and becomes 
a matter of public importance far beyond the 
present numerical strength of this company of 
wage-earning women. 

There is the fear that the home has been in- 
jured by women entering the factory and store, 
with the accompanying opinion that all women 
must be trained for the home. Such a point of 
view appears to be unshaken by any statement 
regarding the increasing number of women who 
are obliged to earn their living; that there are 
thousands of young girls who are obliged to work 
for pay in our stores and factories before mar- 
riage ; and that the home itself has changed along 
with the changing of industrial conditions. 

Breaking down old lines. 

It is believed that the employment of women 
will mean greater competition with men and their 
work, with a consequent reduction of the living 
wage. While it is not absolutely true that women 



68 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

have driven out the men and that they are doing 
the work of men, it is a fact that there has been 
a readjustment of the work of both men and 
women. The introduction of machinery and a 
consequent evolution of methods of factory pro- 
duction have broken down the old lines of demar- 
cation between women's work and men's work. 
For example, the textile trades, which historically 
have been women's work, are to-day shared with 
men. At the present time weaving threatens to 
become men's work. Only a few years ago the 
weaving of cotton goods was regarded as peculi- 
arly the work of women. The introduction of 
improved and fast looms has so changed condi- 
tions that approximately half of the cotton mill 
weavers in the country are men. The number of 
places in which women can be profitably employed 
steadily decreases as the speed of the machinery 
increases and as the requirements are extended 
demanding that one hand shall tend a greater 
number of machines. To a still larger degree, 
the increase of male mill operatives is due to the 
number of male immigrants who desire to work 
in the mills, and to the widening field of employ- 
ment of women in commercial establishments and 
in other lines of industry paying better wages 
and affording opportunity to work in a less tax- 
ing and higher grade of industry. 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 69 

A weak position. 

Not only are women prevented by inferior 
physical strength from competing for certain 
superior industrial occupations but more gener- 
ally they are prevented by inferior training and 
experience. Moreover, their ambition is lessened 
by the knowledge that they will probably be wage 
earners for only six or seven years. The tend- 
ency to undertake unskilled work which brings 
them an immediate return, the weakness of 
women's trades unions, the large number of un- 
employed and unskilled women and their suppos- 
edly lower productivity, are factors which throw 
light on the question why women are paid less 
than men and why a large number of occupations 
have been given over to them with a consequence 
that men will not attempt to compete with them 
at all on these levels for work and wages. 

Speed and capacity to gain more speed have 
been the key that has opened the door to a higher 
wage. A certain dexterity or an inborn knack 
for the thing they do has given some women an 
economic advantage over men in portions of some 
industries, as, for example, in shoemaking. In 
the colonial period shoemaking was looked upon 
as man's work. The cobbling of shoes by the 
village shoemaker, who kept a shop or went from 
house to house, was exclusively in the hands of 



70 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

men. From the cobbler shop attached to the 
house, where one man made the whole shoe, there 
developed a system of division of labor, when 
this man became a small manufacturer by the 
hiring of a few neighbors to work with him — 
one man to cut the leather, another to fit and sew 
the uppers and still another to fasten the uppers 
to the soles. 

A new occupation. 

Women were never shoemakers in any proper 
sense of the term, and their relation to the in- 
dustry began when these small manufacturers 
discovered that the labor of women and children 
could be utilized by giving them the uppers to 
stitch in the home and return to the shop to have 
the soles sewed on. As a consequence women in 
or near the shoe towns of Massachusetts became, 
in a measure, self-supporting by getting uppers 
to sew and bind. The women carried on a single 
well-defined part of the work; they did all the 
work in their own homes ; they worked irregularly 
in the intervals of household duties. In this con- 
nection it is interesting to note how history re- 
peats itself, for to-day the so-called sweat shop, 
occupying a part of a tenement house, harbors a 
Eussian Jew who divides his. time irregularly be- 
tween household duties and an assignment of ma- 
terial from some neighboring factory. 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 71 

The manufacture of shoes was bound to be 
completely revolutionized by the invention of 
the sewing- machine and machines for pegging, 
preparing sole leather and cutting soles. These 
new machines and the later substitution of steam 
power had their marked effect on the industry 
and its workers. No invention changed the work 
of men so completely as the sewing machine 
changed the work of women. As machines for 
sewing uppers to soles and binding parts of up- 
pers together began to be more generally used the 
rates for work done at home grew increasingly 
lower, and women who worked at home were 
gradually obliged to go to the factory and work 
all day, with the consequence that the industry 
ceased to be a ^^pin money industry" which 
women could carry on in a leisurely fashion at 
home. 

Though shoemaking remains a man's industry 
there has been an enormous increase in the pro- 
portion of women employees. Their occupations 
are distinctively those of stitching, finishing and 
packing. The work affords opportunity for ad: 
vancement because of the gradation of processes 
and gives relatively steady employment with a 
good living wage. The industry may be classed 
as desirable from the point of effect on character. 
A large majority of both men and women workers 
are native born. The hours af labor are reason- 



72 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

able; the sanitary conditions of most of the fac- 
tories are admirable ; the wages, in general, are so 
much higher than in the textile mills that the girls 
leave the latter for the shoe factories, which thus 
continue to attract the more intelligent native- 
born working people. 

From home to factory. 

Garment-making, among all the industries 
which have left the home and ranged themselves 
in the factories, is of supreme importance in a 
study of women in industry. No industry would 
seem to belong more properly to the home, yet 
it has passed from the home to the factory. 
From being one of the occupations of women it 
has become a trade of both men and women. 
The dressmakers and seamstresses of a century 
ago have become the shirtwaist makers, the skirt 
makers, the coat makers of to-day. The develop- 
ment of this industry extends even further. It 
deals with a complicated group of separate in- 
dustries such as men's overalls, women's shirt- 
waists, cloaks, pants and vests, underwear, sus- 
penders, etc. 

Needlework of. any kind has always been re- 
garded as within woman's sphere, but in a study 
of the clothing industry we find that many men 
have come into it. The ready-made clothing in- 
dustry started with the custom tailor, who em- 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 73 

ployed his slack season in making up a stock of 
ready-to-wear clothes. He made use of the serv- 
ices of his wife and daughters. Later the men 
did the cutting and the women made the trousers 
and waistcoats. Immigrants began to come into 
the industry in large numbers. In its nature it 
was similar to the early stages of the shoe indus- 
try. The home shop idea sprung into existence. 
The tailor divided his work into machine sewing, 
basting and finishing. The invention of the sew- 
ing machine affected the industry as it did shoe- 
making. The men assumed the more skilled and 
more difficult portion of the industry and became 
overseers, cutters, trimmers and pressers, while 
the women were machine operators and trousers 
and vest makers. 

Men and women. 

Garment-making is impartial in the employ- 
ment of men and of women. The cutters are 
nearly always men because the work requires 
muscular strength, knowledge of materials and 
judgment in the laying out of the cloth. The 
pressing department is a more contested field be- 
tween men and women, the former having the 
advantage of strength, the latter the cheapness 
of their labor. In the operations requiring the 
use of the single-needle, power-driven machine 
the women have the field to themselves, the work 



74 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

varying from the entire garment system to tlie 
division of labor on the cheaper grades of goods. 
The wages depend upon their speed, and esti- 
mates vary as to how long it takes them to earn 
living wages. In a week's time they can learn to 
run a machine, but it is several months before 
they can earn good wages. Theory may be ac- 
quired in a week but not dexterity. 

As one enters a garment-making factory he is 
greeted with the roar of wheels and the shaking 
of the floor. The use of the power machine car- 
ries with it its own tenseness. No girl who is 
incapable of concentrated effort can remain in a 
garment factory. The air is often bad and the 
lighting poor, and the noise is always terrific. 
Some factories with modern systems of ventila- 
tion and protection of machinery wheels, are kept 
within the bounds of decency, and still others are 
absolutely unfit. 

The sweat shop. 

In contrast to the average factory there are 
the work shops in the tenements in which garments 
are manufactured by the regular occupants of 
the home, sometimes assisted by neighbors. 
Men, mostly Eussian Jews, are found working at 
the machines, while women finish the garments 
by hand. The hour for stopping work is not lim- 
ited by a time clock system. Often the labor of 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 75 

the individual stops only when the material gives 
out. The advent of these Jews in the industry 
has been an important factor in changing the 
status of women in garment-making. 

At this point one is immediately led into vari- 
ous problems with which the industry is closely 
connected, such as the sweating system and the 
legislative attempts to control it, the unsanitary 
conditions in homes and cheap workshops, and, 
finally, the whole problem of the competition of 
foreign labor. The clothing industry has been 
more affected than any other trade by the suc- 
cessive waves of immigrant labor, and women 
have felt keenly the pressure of immigrants in 
the low-grade unskilled work of this trade. 

This great industry presents a very difficult 
industrial and social problem. It appears to be 
open to attack on all sides — from the crowded 
tenement with its sweat shop to the noisy factories 
where there are assembled large numbers of ma- 
chines in one room. The industry promises a 
good industrial opportunity for women when the 
work is carried on in factories or high-grade 
workrooms with legislative protection as to light, 
heat, noise and cleanliness. 

Where will it end? 

Work in a textile mill, garment-making, and 
shoemaking in a factory, by more or less stretch- 



76 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

ing of the imagination, can be considered as hav- 
ing some relation to the traditional activities of 
women. Likewise, there is some reason for be- 
lieving that fruit preserving, bookbinding, laun- 
dering and candy dipping have some bearing upon 
the sort of industrial work in which one would 
naturally think that women should be engaged. 
But women have gained a foothold in some indus- 
tries that would seem to belong to men. One 
would hardly expect that women would be found 
molding metals, cutting files or making glass, yet 
such is a fact. Little by little industrial forces 
have called into these factories the female immi- 
grants from Eussia, Austria and Poland. These 
women have not the conservatism of the 
native born. There is a flexibility in their at- 
titude toward life and toward their part in 
it. They accept factory positions that girls 
of other races regard as socially inferior. They 
consent to do rough and unpleasant work. The 
Slavic women, for example, having been ac- 
customed to hard work in the fields of their 
native land, consider work in tin plate mills or 
screw and bolt works almost a Mecca of oppor- 
tunity. Work and working conditions which 
would not be tolerated by American girls have 
been regarded with indifference by these immi- 
grants. They have not awakened to their real 
opportunities and responsibilities. Some are 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 77 

working at wages below the cost of subsistence, 
for hours longer than the measure of their 
strength and at processes which will handicap 
the development of body, mind and soul. What 
are we going to do about it? 

Industrial tides are not swept back by brooms 
in the hands of well-intentioned people. Of 
course, the work these immigrants are doing is 
inappropriate, but it has as its basis an industrial 
development which makes for cheapness of prod- 
uct. Such an industrial movement so significant 
of evil consequences to society may not be easily 
stayed, yet it may be directed and controlled by 
law and public opinion, grounded on a careful 
study of industrial conditions and the needs of 
human living. 

Industrial training necessary. 

An attempt has been made to sketch briefly 
the industrial history of woman in three of the 
principal industries in which she is engaged, as 
well as to say a word about her entrance into those 
trades which have been considered as being apart 
from her field of activity. Her early economic 
conditions and relationships have been touched 
upon with the hope of some resultant understand- 
ing of the industrial opportunity of the working 
woman of the earlier times and the progress 
which she has made up to the present day. Some 



78 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

phases of her industrial development are very 
favorable ; others cannot but impress the thought- 
ful person with a sense that somehow and some- 
where society has erred. At least one portion 
of the problem is clear — that the industrial train- 
ing which formerly came to her in the home must 
now be received in other ways if she is to play 
an important part in industrial life. Educa- 
tional authorities must study ways and means of 
providing training for industrial efficiency for 
girls as well as for boys. 

Study of women's occupations. 

In order to determine the nature of the train- 
ing which must be given to girls who are obliged 
to earn a living in these or other industries, one 
should know what effect the unskilled work has 
on the industry and its workers, on their standard 
of living and on their life in their future homes. 
One needs to study what industries furnish the 
best opportunities for personal growth and power 
and what proportion of all women are spending 
some years of their lives in industry. 

Such a study would necessarily be very inten- 
sive and would involve, first, the home condi- 
tions, occupation and wages of women in the 
various industries; second, the standard of the 
living wage; and third, the conditions, oppor- 
tunities and possibilities of woman in specified 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 79 

industries. This investigation would strike at 
the very roots of many social and industrial 
problems. The definition of a living wage opens 
up a world of thought. Shall it be limited to the 
earning of a minimum living wage, or shall it 
aim at an income sufficient to provide opportunity 
for that self-improvement which is afforded by 
the margin of income and by leisure hours? 
Shall it be gauged by the least wage by which a 
woman can sustain herself or by the value of her 
productive power to her employer, or by her 
value, as a human being, to society? 

Claims of society. 

At all events, the home conditions, wages and 
opportunities of employment must be governed by 
three principles; first, they must keep alive her 
natural powers so that she will not be reduced 
to a mere automaton; second, they must develop 
that kind of efficiency which will be of value to the 
woman as a homemaker; and third, they must 
not be detrimental to her physically or morally. 
For its own strength, society cannot afford to 
permit its girl workers to receive a wage too low 
for nutrition or for the refreshment of exhausted 
strength ; neither can it afford to have them work- 
ing in industries which weaken them in their work- 
ing life and so react upon their later domestic 
relations as to leave a heritage of weakness and 



80 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

inefficiency. Moreover, recreation and richness 
of life in leisure hours are equally a source of 
decency and of health, and no industrial success 
is worthy of the name if its contributors lead lives 
void of spiritual meaning. Public sentiment can- 
not rest content with any form of work for women, 
or men either, which merely makes existence pos- 
sible. No work, wage nor worker can long stand 
in the way of the social progress of a people. 

Commendable efforts have been made to 
standardize the health of our women industrial 
workers through state laws and factory inspec- 
tions. Eecent agitation for a more thorough or- 
ganization of women's trades unions will tend 
to standardize wages. The next step is to stand- 
ardize intelligence. It is a more subtle problem 
and will react favorably upon a higher living 
wage, for then women can demand equal pay for 
equal work because they will have more instances 
of equal work to show. Increasing industrial in- 
telligence and efficiency gained through industrial 
education will go far toward raising working 
women to the position — personal, social and eco- 
nomic — that all who study the problem of women 
in industry expect to see realized. 

An experiment station. 

Some experiments have been made in industrial 
training for girls which are significant and sug- 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 81 

gest a definite way for their advance and im- 
provement. One of these educational experiment 
stations is the Manhattan Trade School for Grirls 
in New York City. Its immediate purpose is to 
train the youngest and poorest wage earner to 
be self-supporting as quickly as possible. Many 
of these girls enter industry, as Jane Addams 
says, ^'at its most painful point where the trades 
are so overcrowded and subdivided that there 
remains in them very little education for the 
worker." The ideals of the school have been 
well expressed by its director, Mary S. Woolman, 
as follows: first, to train a girl that she may 
become self-supporting; second, to furnish a 
training which shall enable the worker to shift 
from one occupation to another allied occupation ; 
third, to teach a girl to understand her relation 
to her employer, to her fellow worker and to her 
product; fourth, to train her to value health and 
to know how to keep and improve it ; fifth, to de- 
velop a better woman while making a successful 
worker. 

The selection of the trades taught in the Man- 
hattan Trade School was made after a careful 
investigation of the numerous occupations in New 
York that are open to women. The present cur- 
riculum includes instruction, first, in the use of 
electric-power sewing machines, including general 
operating, special machines, dressmaking operat- 



82 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

ing and straw sewing ; second, the use of the needle 
and foot power sewing machines including dress 
and garment making, millinery and lampshade 
making; third, the use of paste and glue includ- 
ing sample mounting, tissue paper novelties and 
case making; fourth, the use of brush and pencil 
with work in perforating and stamping, costume 
sketching and retouching. 

In general, it may be said of the occupations 
chosen that they employ a large number of 
women; that they require expert workers; and 
that training for them is difficult to obtain. 
There is a chance in these occupations for rising 
to better positions. The wages are good, and 
favorable conditions, both physical and moral, 
prevail in the workrooms. 

Every student has as part of her trade educa- 
tion such academic work, art and physical train- 
ing as seem necessary. A worker with skill of 
hand, reinforced with a general education, has 
the opportunity to rise in her vocation. An oc- 
cupation that calls for a little knowledge as well 
as for dexterity becomes immediately a stimulus 
to the intelligence. To rise to important posi- 
tions in factories or stores requires a combina- 
tion of practical knowledge of the craft, together 
with ability to utilize book knowledge in rapid 
deductions, business letters and other trade trans- 
actions. 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 83 

Meeting working conditions. 

The training is by no means of the amateur or- 
der, for the school has a trade order department 
where the product is sold to the trade or to pri- 
vate customers at regular market prices. This 
feature has proved itself to be an important ed- 
ucational factor. Prof. Woolman states that it 
serves several purposes. It provides the ..stu- 
dents with adequate experience on classes of ma- 
terials used in the best workrooms; the business 
relation between school and market impresses 
the students with the necessity of good finish, 
rapid work and responsibility for delivery on 
time; the businesslike appearance of the shops 
at work on orders increases the confidence of the 
employers in the ability of the school to train 
practical workers for the trades; the system re- 
quires business organization and management 
which in themselves can be utilized for educa- 
tional purposes. 

Great care has been exercised in maintaining 
the proper cooperative spirit between the em- 
ployers and the working people. It is always 
an important question as to the effect such in- 
struction may have on those- who are already 
employed in the industry and who might be dis- 
advantaged by thoughtless actions on the part of 
the school authorities in placing the girl gradu- 
ates in positions where a strike is on, in replac- 



84 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

ing well-paid positions with trade school girls at 
a less price, or finally, in placing girls at too small 
a wage for their skill. Such problems are com- 
mon to the proposed trade schools for boys, but 
the matter of preparing girls for industrial vo- 
cations is especially difficult, owing to the present 
economic and industrial status of women. 

Which shall it he? 

Early in the chapter mention was made of the 
*' vocation of homemaking." It is too important 
an occupation to ignore. Up to this point we 
have /been concerned with women ^s work in the 
manufacturing industries. We have seen that 
in former times the home was practically wom- 
an's entire world; that most of what was pro- 
duced to meet the needs of the people originated 
there, while all of it found ready consumption 
within the family circle or by limited exchange. 
Gradually the home industries, such as the man- 
ufacture of dress goods, carpets, bedding, can- 
dles, soap, shoes and hats, have passed into the 
factory. The preparation of food is almost the 
only work left to the home which may be called 
creative, unless we include the supreme work of 
developing men and women. In early periods of 
American life women were not particularly con- 
cerned with the question of whether they should 
enter commercial life or have a home of their 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 85 

own. Public sentiment was all one way. At the 
present time it is in favor of either or both, and 
no one, and especially no man, is entitled to say 
which. 

The educated woman, club woman or other- 
wise, longs for a career, for an opportunity to 
influence the world, and just now it would seem 
that the greatest field offered to her is the eleva- 
tion of the home to its place in American life. 
She may choose the home as her career, not be- 
cause she can have no other, not because she can 
in no other way support herself, but because she 
believes in it as the place and means of educat- 
ing and perfecting the ideal human being, and 
because she believes that it is worth while to give 
her energy, skill and thought to the service of 
her country and age. 

Importance of the home. 

Of the five factors which influence the forma- 
tion of character — that is, home, school, state, 
church and vocation — undoubtedly the kind of a 
home provided has by far the greatest direct and 
indirect influence. Theodore Roosevelt states: 
^'Nothing outside of home can take its place. 
The school is an invaluable adjunct to the home, 
but it is a wretched substitute for it. The fam- 
ily relation is the most fundamental, the most 
important of all relations. No leader in church 



Se THE WOEKER AND THE STATE 

or state, in science or art or industry, however 
great his achievement, does work which com- 
pares in importance with that of the father and 
the mother." 

Surely it is a problem to tax the brightest 
minds, for the making of a home involves eco- 
nomic, sociologic and ethical considerations, if 
the fullest interpretation is to be given to this 
social institution. To achieve the best results 
there must be employed scientific and artistic 
methods of thought and work. Everyone must 
live in some sort of a home and is likely to find 
his chief happiness there. No great advance, 
spiritual or material, is possible which does not 
begin with the home. To a large measure, the 
homemakers of America have the making of a 
nation. 

Home-keeping a profession. 

Homemaking should be regarded as a profes- 
sion. Much illness results from carelessness, ig- 
norance or intemperance of some kind. It is 
probably true that as many lives are cut short 
by unhealthful food and diet as through strong 
drink. The upbringing of children demands 
more study than the breeding of cattle. The 
spending of money is as important as the earning 
of money. Economy does not necessarily mean 
spending a small amount, but rather getting the 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 87 

largest returns for the money expended. The 
homemaker should be as alert to make progress 
in her life work as the business or professional 
man. 

Extension of the public school, 

Kecently the public school has undertaken the 
responsibility of extending its work into the 
household science field, that the benefit of such 
organized instruction may reach all women as 
a part of their general education. When such 
liberal training is widespread, then the public 
may expect the rational and justifiable in house- 
hold procedure where we now have the haphaz- 
ard and traditional. This much to be desired 
condition of general understanding and appreci- 
ation of the dignity and interest attaching' to 
household activities will come about through a 
knowledge on the part of every school girl of the 
laws which interpret the processes and mate- 
rials used in the home. Such knowledge will be 
secured to her by her experience during her 
school days with the utility of the products of her 
efforts. The school has its place as a corrective 
of the deficiencies of the home. The leaders of 
education should be able to foresee the needs of 
the future citizen and by school training to in- 
fluence quickly a whole generation. Eeady adap- 
tability to changing conditions should make the 



88 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

school a potent factor, by using its preventive 
power, in doing away with the results of igno- 
rance. 

Lack of industrial spirit. 

In the woman's world there has been little or- 
ganization. Woman has not seen its advantages, 
and being conserver rather than originator, has 
seldom gone beyond tradition. The special field 
in which she lives and works remains detached 
and undeveloped. It is rather remarkable that 
for centuries woman has allowed every industry 
which she organized to pass into the hands of 
men. The records of invention show that it is 
always the man who has forced the woman to 
give up her heavy stones for grinding and try 
the mill; to use an improved loom; to accept the 
cook stove instead of the open fire; the sewing 
machine instead of the needle. The sewing ma- 
chine has enabled her to put a hundred tucks 
where once she put three, and every garment is 
made to hold a wilderness of stitching. Compli- 
cation, and always more and more complication, 
has become the order of living; and as if in 
mockery, labor-saving inventions crowd our 
houses and demand a new form of skilled labor 
to take care of them. 

From the very beginning of homes or work- 
shops women seem to have steadfastly labored 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 89 

at complication and men at simplification. A 
successful business man knows how to adapt 
means to ends. His office is a model of com- 
pactness with everything at hand that can make 
work swift and easy, and no man will set up 
any other manufacturing establishment with as 
little regard to the purpose of it all and to the 
future success of its operation as he will allow 
in the inauguration of his household. In all other 
walks of life, in transportation, in manufacturing, 
machinery has come in to replace the heavier and 
more mechanical portions of labor. The steam 
shovel, the hoisting engine, an infinite combina- 
tion of mechanical principles, have been applied 
to the doing of things to save human muscle. 
The machine age has set free the human laborer, 
if only he will qualify himself to use his freedom. 
In the same way the house can make use of me- 
chanical appliances, can harness the forces of 
nature and bring about a spirit of cooperation 
which alone can bring the benefits of modern sci- 
ence to the doors of all. The evolution of in- 
dustry is the evolution of humanity. The grade 
of labor is its station on the line of evolution, 
and any form or degree of labor which belongs 
to a lower period of human evolution is degrad- 
ing. Scientific thought must be brought into 
household affairs as it has been into manufac- 
turiag. 



90 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

It has been well stated by H. G. Wells that 
*Hhe plain message that physical science has for 
the world at large is this ; that, were our political 
and social and moral devices only as well contrived 
to their ends as a linotype machine, an antiseptic 
operating plant, or an electric tram car, there 
need now, at the present moment, be no appreci- 
able toil in the world and only the smallest frac- 
tion of the pain, fear and the anxiety that now 
make human life so doubtful in its value. There 
is more than enough for everyone alive. Science 
stands as a competent servant behind her wrang- 
ling, underbred masters, holding out resources, 
devices and remedies which they are too stupid 
to use.'' Science has obeyed the call of factory 
production. The inventor has furnished auto- 
matic devices which make manual labor simpler 
and cleaner. Women as well as men have heard 
this call of the factory with the result that there 
is an increasing scarcity of domestic servants. 

The servant question. 

The problem of obtaining efficient domestic 
service is a vital one. The evolution of industry 
and commerce has been sufficiently attractive to 
call the girl away from such service. The most 
modern form of human labor is in the factory. 
It is surrounded by science and invention, while 
domestic service stands in our social economy as 



WO]\IEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 91 

the last survival of the lowest form of human 
labor. As one has aptly phrased it, ''the differ- 
ence between the servant and the factory worker 
is the difference between obedience and agree- 
ment, the difference between submission and ac- 
quiescence. ' ' 

It is a common fallacy to expect that the quan- 
tity and quality of domestic service will be raised 
with the general introduction of instruction in 
the household arts in public schools. We are in 
the habit of talking about the ''servant ques- 
tion.'' It is really a service question and at 
present the servant is the product of the service. 
The increasing complexity of household life has 
evolved our household industries to a degree 
where their proper performance demands a 
higher order of ability than is found among 
servants. The present condition of domestic 
servitude allows only the development of a cer- 
tain degree of ability, not sufficient to rightly 
perform our complex domestic industries. When 
we find a person able to carry on modern house- 
hold industries, that person will not be our serv- 
ant. When we find a person willing to be our 
servant, that person is unable to carry on mod- 
ern household industries. When the question of 
household servants is taken up in the drawing- 
room the discussion is about their inadequacy, in- 
subordination and ingratitude. In the servants' 



92 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

room, on the other hand, the discussion concerns 
their inconsiderate treatment, their social inequal- 
ity or the lack of sane directive power in the 
kitchen. 

Call of the factory and store. 

Economic and social conditions control choice 
of occupations. Domestic service has to com- 
pete with other vocations, and when the latter 
afford better wages or shorter hours or more in- 
dividual freedom the trend of labor supply will 
be in favor of the better conditions. 

Courses in household arts in public schools 
will not alone solve the servant question. Such 
a problem will require careful study of a larger 
problem, — the problem of women in industry and 
their reasons for entering it and the means for 
getting them back again into household service. 
Such a study will include a definition of what a 
day's work means in the household; the amount 
of overtime required and the hours of absolute 
freedom guaranteed, especially where the posi- 
tion is that of a child's nurse; the providing of 
a comfortably warmed and decently furnished 
room, and a decent place and appointments for 
meals; arranging that the heaviest work, such 
as carrying coal, scrubbing pavements, and wash- 
ing, be done through other service; the privilege 
of seeing friends in a better part of the house 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 93 

than the kitchen^ and security from espionage 
during such time. This is to be accompanied by 
reasonable restrictions as to hours and with the 
condition that work is not to be neglected; and 
finally, such a manner of speaking to and of the 
server as shall show that housework is as respect- 
able as other occupations. 

Problem of service, 

A study of the economic and social relation- 
ship between the problem of service in the house- 
hold and in the industries, achieves a desirable 
human result, namely, a permanent interest in 
the organized industries with which the house- 
hold industries are closely connected. The 
home sends out many workers into these indus- 
tries, is dependent on the products of such or- 
ganized labor and is vitally affected econom- 
ically and socially by the conditions prevailing 
among the workers. In this interdependence and 
the relationship thereby established is the possi- 
bility of studying the ethical bearings of wom- 
an's work. 

Vocation of homemahing. 

But to return to the educational, social and 
economic value of homemaking as a vocation, the 
household industries may be classified as fol- 
lows; first. The industries connected with food. 



94 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

These supply the primary need of daily nutrition 
and the secondary and accompanying one of hu- 
man satisfaction; second, the industries connec- 
ted with clothing. These contribute directly to 
protection and comfort and gratify the desire for 
decoration; third, the industries connected with 
shelter. These are essentially for protection 
and the maintenance of family life and are di- 
rectly conducive to the larger social life. 

Need of readjustmenP. 

The need in household organization is for a 
complete readjustment in accordance with mod- 
ern conditions. If a serious study is undertaken 
of the various elements which go to make up the 
daily routine, this adjustment may be accom- 
plished without loss of essentials, and without this 
basis of knowledge any effort will be likely to 
cause confusion. In the first place, the home 
has ceased to be the center of production and 
has become but a pool toward which products 
made in other places flow. In short, it is a place 
of consumption, not of production, and women 
must take their place as organizers and super- 
intendents of the economic consumption of 
wealth. All women should know about the wise 
spending of money, even if they are not familiar 
through actual personal experience with the 
laws of production. Very likely if present tend- 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 95 

encies are maintained they will know about 
both. We have been accustomed to think that 
men made the money and so retained the right 
to spend it. Fortunately, we have recently 
caught the idea that women might have the 
requisite skill and knowledge to make money 
and to spend it carefully. In many instances, it 
is the woman who spends and upon her rests 
some of the responsibility of the standards that 
govern the spending of money for the home and 
the community. This responsibility is not small. 
Prof. E. T. Devine emphasizes this point in say- 
ing, "It is the present duty of the economist to 
magTiify the office of the wealth expender. . . . 
There is no economic function higher than that 
of determining how wealth shall be used ; . . . 
more discriminating choice necessitates more 
discriminating production.'^ There is food for 
thought in that phrase. That it is possible to 
influence production by a wise selection of prod- 
ucts is shown by the work of the Consumers' 
League, which has had its influence upon wages, 
hours and legislation. 

The family budget. 

From a long study of family budgets Prof. 
Ellen Richards of the Massachusetts Institute of 
Technology found that the higher the income the 
smaller is the percentage of the cost of subsist- 



96 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

ence; that clothing assumes and keeps a dis- 
tinctly consistent proportion to the whole bud- 
get; that lodging, heating and lighting have an 
invariable portion of the income ; and finally, that 
the more the income increases the greater is the 
proportion of the different expenses which ex- 
press the degree of well-being. The less the 
worker gains, the more in proportion he invests 
in food, renouncing out of necessity all other 
desires. This last statement convincingly shows 
that people of moderate income need to make a 
careful study of the food question, because with 
every increase in the cost of food production, 
there is a diminishing amount available for re- 
ligion, recreation and education and the other 
interests of the higher life. In this connection 
it is well to recall the statement of Edmond Dem- 
olin: ^^The most judicious use of money is to 
form for one's self first of all as pleasant and 
comfortable a home as is consistent with one's 
means. Money thus spent is money safely in- 
vested." 

Women should grasp the connection between 
the spending of money and the results in the 
mere physical needs of life. They should not be 
satisfied until, through exercise of knowledge 
of the laws of cause and effect, they are able to 
make their tables wholesome as well as attractive 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 97 

and economical, their surroundings clean and their 
clothes properly protective as well as ornamental. 
These will be steps towards competency in exer- 
cising a wiser and broader scheme of satisfaction 
for other needs no less important. 

Animals vs, people. 

Eeference has already been made to food. 
The educated woman whose major subject in col- 
lege was biology often fails to connect the knowl- 
edge she has stored up with the best development 
of her physical life, and remains indifferent to 
the helpful application to her own living that 
she might make of the laws she has learned. 
She treated her laboratory specimens with more 
care and intelligence than she would dream of 
giving to her food. Eaisers of cattle and of 
poultry have long known that proper feeding de- 
termined the nature of the product. Cows are 
fed in one way for milk and in another for cream ; 
hens in one way for eggs and in quite another 
way for fattening for market. Few women have 
any real knowledge of food nutrients and their 
proper combinations. To many of them food is 
a question of amount and variety rather than one 
of nourishment. It is often the case that where 
the most is expended for food, the poorest re- 
sults are obtained in matters of health. 



98 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

The chemistry of living. 

It must be remembered that the full grown 
adult takes in each day through mouth and lungs 
about eight and a half pounds of dry food and 
the air necessary for breathing purposes. 
Through every pore of the skin, the lungs, the 
kidneys, the lower intestines, there is a corre- 
sponding waste; and supply and waste together 
in the course of a year amount to about one and 
a half tons! This food is made up of sixteen 
different elements. The simplest division of food 
is into flesh formers and heat producers, the 
former being often called nitrogenous foods, 
proteids, or albuminoids, the latter heat-giving 
or carbonaceous foods. Oxygen is the only one 
of these that is mainly used in its natural state. 
Water, which makes considerably over two- 
thirds of the body, enters largely into the com- 
position of food, and appears in vegetables, eggs, 
fish, cheese, the cereals and even the fats. The 
demand for food includes fat, sugar, starch, ni- 
trogenous foods and the salts — meat, fish and 
potatoes containing phosphorous, lime and mag- 
nesia. Potash is given us in meat, fish, milk, 
vegetables and fruits. Iron abounds in flesh 
and vegetables, and sulphur enters into albumen, 
casein and fibrine. It is readily seen that cook- 
ing is a chemical process, and enough has been 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 99 

said to make it clear that a knowledge of the 
processes and materials involved in the art and 
science of food preparation has in it all the dis- 
ciplinary value of the more traditional and formal 
education along scientific lines, not to mention 
the more homely, but no less valuable advan- 
tages of knowing how to cook. 

A well-dressed woman. 

The question of clothing is next in order. For 
a woman to feel herself well dressed is essential 
to self-respect and moral equilibrium. However, 
the realization of the term depends on her own 
ideals and not on the fashion plates. Various 
notions prevail as to what constitutes a well- 
dressed woman. One might venture to say that 
to be perfectly fitted, to have lines and colors 
becoming to one's figure and complexion, to be 
wholesome and clean and neat, and to have the 
clothing a part of the personality constitute an 
appropriately gowned woman. One might add 
another quality: to have the price of her gowns 
fit the pocketbook. It is right and proper to 
appear in harmonious colors and graceful forms, 
but the more important life of the soul should not 
be crippled by the use of too much money and 
time for this outward show. 



100 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

A study of textiles. 

A sewing course in the public schools will in- 
clude a study of textiles from their origin in the 
four essential fibres to their completion in 
fabrics. Its specific aim will be to interest the 
girls in this work by relating it to their home, 
school and community life, that their resulting 
application may accomplish for them facility in 
technique and a high standard of excellence in 
the product. This interest in textiles can be 
made continuous throughout the entire school 
course, so many and varied are the aspects of 
the subject. From the making of mats by the 
crudest hand-weaving process to the highly 
specialized tools used in handling elaborate ma- 
terials, the field of textiles is not overstepped. 
Such an extensive subject has many possibili- 
ties for school program-making. The home is 
fertile with suggestions for articles, both useful 
and beautiful, to make up the list of products as 
the outcome of a sewing course; the school will 
furnish its share of suggestions, while a large 
number of community utilities are possible in 
the needs of institutions, public and private, 
which repeat the home needs on a large scale but 
supply the altruistic motive to the students in 
their work. Processes of dyeing and cloth print- 
ing will be taken up by students to give them a 
basis as consumers for the selection of suitable 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 101 

and durable material for their purposes. Color, 
form and proportion will be embodied in every 
article made. Emphasis on these aspects of the 
textile subject will not only train good workers 
through a knowledge of the use of tools and the 
control of the processes in the making of arti- 
cles, but will educate women in the choice of 
proper clothing and furnishing for all occasions, 
and of good material of pleasing color and de- 
sign for the money expended. Thus purchasing 
will become a matter of taste and economy. The 
reaction on the manufacturer's output is sure to 
be apparent when knowledge and taste are a com- 
mon possession of consumers. 

Connection with other studies. 

The whole subject may become a vital and in- 
teresting one by considering its relation to the 
industrial activities of people and to the phases 
of life represented by other school subjects, par- 
ticularly geography, history and art. In this 
way the ordinary academic subjects may be vital- 
ized. A course in geography can be arranged 
to deal with the nature of the regions supplying 
the vegetables and animal fibres, with the culti- 
vation of the raw material and its transportation. 
History can show the development of the textile 
industries, the effect on the life of the people 
working in them due to the inventions in weav- 



102 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

ing and spinning machinery, and the increasing 
organization of their work into the factory sys- 
tem as a direct result of these inventions. In 
this connection the class may discuss the subject 
of unions of workers and consumers, to bring out 
the idea that each organization is for the pur- 
pose of fortifying the individual's endeavor to 
produce and consume under the best possible 
conditions and with the best possible results. 
Art and design as a correlated subject to a study 
of textiles is apparent. To choose the beautiful 
in design, color and form in the furnishing of the 
home and in wearing apparel, requires training 
along art lines, particularly in the case of those 
who are not fortunate enough to live in an at- 
mosphere of beauty. 

The house we live in. 

And finally, we have the study of shelter. 
House architecture is away behind shop, office 
and factory construction. The traditional con- 
servatism of the housewife, combined with ig- 
norance of scientific appliances, and lack of ar- 
tistic appreciation has brought about this state 
of affairs. One of the things most needed in a 
conception of right house furnishing is the elim- 
ination of all that speaks of toil. Home is, or 
should be, a place of rest. Every device that 
makes work easier should be employed. Mod- 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 103 

ern open plumbing, enamelled sinks and set 
bowls, tiled bathroom walls, hardwood floors 
with rugs, vacuum cleaners, bread mixers, sani- 
tary ice chests, and the thousand and one little 
inventions or improvements that are now on 
the market will do much to eliminate toil and at 
the same time make for better sanitation. Sys- 
tems of heating and the theories of draughts, 
should be studied. Likewise, the science of plumb- 
ing is important. Women are failing to meet the 
modern scientific requirements in matters im- 
portant to health. People have come to expect 
pure air only out of doors. The possibility of 
having pure air in their living rooms requires a 
more thorough understanding of the system of 
heating. So much of life is spent indoors, ven- 
tilation ought to interest everybody, and it would 
do so if people realized its close connection with 
health. The science of plumbing, as it is rapidly 
developing, is another instance of the growing 
appreciation of the importance of those things 
so long regarded as mere conveniences. More- 
over, we can have beauty in decoration if we only 
know enough to want it, and girls can learn in 
school all that is necessary in order to want it, 
appreciate it and, to a large measure, obtain it if 
effort is made in this direction. 

As a people we know next to nothing of deco- 
rative art, and until every young school girl or 



104 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

woman recognizes that beauty is part of the house 
and must be learned with no less diligence than is 
given to other subjects that go towards the mak- 
ing of a home, it cannot be a natural inheritance 
of a people. It is a poor conception of good art 
to be satisfied with the semblance of a fire of logs 
in the shape of an asbestos-covered gas log. 

The dignity of it all. 

An adequate treatment of these industries 
would cover a whole system of education ; in fact, 
education means one continuous and increas- 
ingly well-ordered relationship with the body of 
knowledge and the activities involved in the sci- 
ences, arts and resulting philosophy of life 
which these three subjects of food, clothing and 
shelter comprehend and create. A study in our 
public schools of the dignity and magnitude of 
the relationships existing between the household 
and world industries ought to result in an eleva- 
tion in the standard of nutrition; a saner, more 
appropriate and artistic style of clothing; more 
comfortable and attractive homes; the attain- 
ment of maximum efficiency in women's activities 
at the minimum cost of energy, time and money. 
It will rest largely with the teachers of these sub- 
jects to impress their students with the connec- 
tion of their work with the economic and social 
values of processes and results, the ethics in- 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 105 

volved in points of view regarding work and 
workers, and tlie historic development of house 
industries leading to an intelligent interest in 
present conditions. Unfortunately, often the 
technical side of the work becomes so absorbing 
to both teacher and pupil that neither realizes the 
tremendous significance of a proper study of the 
household organization and its relation to social 
and economic laws. 

Wage-earning and homemaMng. 

A few conclusions need to be drawn with ref- 
erence to the vocational education of girls. As 
has already been pointed out, the problem of 
providing for two lines of training, homemak- 
ing and industrial, is a peculiarly difficult one. 
As far as is practicable, the period up to sixteen 
should be reserved for school life, and along with 
the necessary liberal education the latter years 
of this period should be made fairly rich in the 
vocational education which will contribute to 
health and mastery of the home arts and the so- 
cial knowledge which may be of use later in home- 
making. At the same time it must be realized 
that the girl may become a wage earner in some 
calling which will claim her attention for any- 
where from ^ve to eight or ten years. It is ev- 
ident that, so far as is practicable, those voca- 
tions should be sought for girls, which prepare, 



106 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

not too remotely, for ultimate efficiency in the 
home. However, it must be frankly recognized 
that the vast majority of wage-earning callings 
to-day open to young women have very little 
bearing on home efficiency. Obviously, it will 
remain true that there will be vocations for 
women which require several years of special 
preparation. Teaching, nursing, secretarial work 
and the like offer such careers. Society can af- 
ford to provide special vocational schools for 
those interested in these callings. At the same 
time we must not lose sight of the fact that the 
number will be small in proportion to those who 
must enter the great wage-working callings which 
have already been briefly outlined. 

Vocational education for girls is in its infancy. 
While more is being said about industrial train- 
ing for boys, there is no intention to ignore the 
problem of training for girls. The aim of the 
vocational and trade courses for girls is twofold : 
first, to enable them, through the right sort of 
homemaking training, to enter homes of their own 
and assume household duties intelligently, per- 
petuating the type of home that will bring about 
the highest standard of health and morals; sec- 
ond, to train by means of courses of trade in- 
struction for work in distinctly feminine occu- 
pations. Probably the time is not far away 



WOMEN IN H0J\1E AND INDUSTRY 107 

wlien every girl will learn some specific kind of 
remunerative skilled work. 

The twofold purpose. 

There is no conflict between these twofold pur- 
poses. It simply means that girls will earn a 
livelihood in some skilled work during the three, 
six or eight years after leaving school and prior 
to marriage, and will do so for their own benefit 
and the good of society. The earning power of 
these girls during these years will raise the stand- 
ard of living in their families and give the impulse 
to a higher level. It means, moreover, that after 
marriage the girls will find most useful that home- 
making training which they had in their voca- 
tional school work. 

Taking these two points of view together, it 
is clear that industrial education for girls should 
embrace those subjects which women should un- 
derstand and which will be of use in life. Dress- 
making, millinery and cooking should be taught 
not only with the idea of enabling girls to direct 
a household in a better and more economical way, 
but also to make them proficient enough to earn 
a living if economic conditions demand it. 

Of the 377 lines of employment listed in the 
census of 1900, women had entered all but 7, in 
greater or less numbers. Nearly 30 per cent of 



108 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

the workers in the factories of New York State 
are women and girls. Bearing in mind that no 
system of vocational education for girls which 
ignores the large facts of homemaking can suc- 
ceed or be defended in the long run, it will be 
necessary to have housekeeping courses as well as 
the specific trade courses. The girls will have 
to be taught to sweep, dust, clean windows and 
paint; to build a fire and care for the stove, sink 
and tables; to cook simple, nutritious dishes in 
family quantities and buy the materials for these 
dishes; to serve a simple meal and know some- 
thing of its nutritive value, expense and fitness; 
to wash and iron garments. 

In the trade school courses the girls should be 
given preparatory training for any trade for 
which there is sufficient demand. It is believed 
that it will prove highly desirable to have such 
courses even if they are comparatively short. Un- 
der vocational school conditions even the special- 
ized factory worker can be made to operate 
certain machines and produce certain results 
which will give her a decided mastery of herself 
and her work on entering the factory. These can 
be made to develop a variety of habits of work 
which the factory itself cannot undertake to teach 
her. She can be given an outlook and a certain 
degree of industrial elasticity which in case of 
need will enable her to shift from one occupation 



WOMEN IN HOME AND INDUSTRY 109 

to another. They can do much to teach the girl 
the ethics of her economic life and especially the 
conditions of maintaining her physical efficiency. 
There will be constant danger in the develop- 
ment of vocational education for girls that the 
standard will be set too high for practical pur- 
poses. If the average woman could look forward 
to being at the age of twenty-three to twenty-five 
at the beginning of, rather than at the end of, her 
wage-earning career, a prolonged course of 
preparation might be desirable — but the facts are 
otherwise. A few of the many possible courses 
which might be organized in girls' trade schools 
are millinery, dressmaking, household design and 
furnishing, institutional cooking and kitchen 
management, hair dressing, manicuring, ready- 
made clothing, bookbinding, box making, glove 
making, engraving and shirt making. 



IV 
EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 

FOE more than a month, in his school work, 
John had been inattentive and preoccupied, 
but to-day he had a peculiarly defiant air ; for to- 
morrow he was fourteen and it was to be his last 
day, and after the dismissal of school he was 
going to the superintendent of schools to get his 
working papers. With a feeling of satisfaction 
he thought that at last he was a real man. He 
could attend the theatre and treat his friends 
with the contents of his first pay envelope. To- 
day marked the last of those problems in stocks 
and bonds and that never ending list of dates to 
be memorized. 

'Attitude of the hoy. 

Now, it must not be supposed that John was 

a particularly bad boy. He was neither lazy nor 

stupid. Very likely he looked forward to the 

one period in the week when he had his manual 

training lesson. He was perfectly willing to 

stay after school and run the patented pencil 

sharpener, to clean the blackboards or beat the 

no 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 111 

chalk erasers. Moreover, he was interested in the 
questions of canals, railroads and steamship 
lines which came up in the geography lesson and 
always sought the reference books that contained 
the descriptions of the lives and inventions of 
Watt, Stephenson, Edison and Marconi. Never- 
theless, as a whole, he disliked school and un- 
fortunately, and even unfairly, the woman teacher 
seemed to him representative of the tyranny of 
its system. With no regret on his part, and with 
much personal joy in the envy of his schoolmates, 
he left at the close of the session. 

Unprofitable work. 

With the possession of the working certificate, 
he realized his freedom from academic restraint. 
He was now a breadwinner, for did he not have 
a job as messenger boy? To be sure, the pay was 
small and the cost of the new uniform had ab- 
sorbed a month's wages, but he was very happy. 
His duties called him to hotels, to saloons, to 
stores and to the homes of the rich. He was see- 
ing life. Then an opportunity came to be a bell 
boy in a hotel. The pay was better and so were 
the tips. Next he was advanced to the position 
of elevator boy with wages of six dollars a week. 
For a time this was good pay to him, but on re- 
questing an advance he was told that there were 
plenty of boys just as competent as himself who 



112 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

could be hired for the money, and with an asser- 
tion of independence he left his employer. 

He was now eighteen years old and looking for 
a **job," or, shall we say ^'position"! He found 
it as a driver of a delivery wagon. His previ- 
ous experience in knocking around the city had 
given him a superficial smartness which passes 
for intelligence. He enjoyed the variety of hu- 
man interests, the out-of-door life and the hurry 
and bustle of city streets. 

The inevitable result. 

But one day he awoke as from a dream. He 
was now twenty-one years old. His pay was 
nine dollars a week with chances of advancement 
to twelve dollars as the limit. He realized for 
the first time that his hold on the economic ladder 
was rather slight and that he had not passed very 
many of its rounds. For the first time he thought 
that learning a trade was the proper procedure, 
although his mother had always begged him to 
have one. He applied for work in a machine 
shop. Being inexperienced and unskilled he was 
offered seventy-five cents a day, or as the alter- 
native, the choice of operating several machines 
which were practically automatic in their action. 
So he decided to continue on the delivery wagon, 
and there we will leave him. 

All teachers have met many such boys and 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 113 

John's case is typical of them all. But the reader 
must not blame him entirely for his decision or 
for the years that he had apparently wasted. 
He would not have fared well if, on leaving school, 
he had applied for a job in this same machine 
shop, for he would have found that skilled in- 
dustries prefer boys who are sixteen years old. 
The employers «ay that they cannot bother with 
the immaturity of youth, for they know that the 
unsteadiness, irresponsibility and lack of training 
of a youth of fourteen are no compensation even 
for the low wages which they pay him. Modern 
production is concerned with the elimination of 
all possible waste, and too young a worker in- 
creases the waste product. 

'Attitude of parents. 

If the boy is not entirely to blame for his 
course, can we censure the parent! Certainly 
not all parents, for over and over again, parents 
say ^^I want my children to stay in school, to get 
an education and then to learn a trade.'' More- 
over, if one may judge from exhaustive investi- 
gations made by the Massachusetts Commission 
on Industrial Education, a majority of parents 
can afford to keep their children in school if in 
their estimation the training gained is worth 
while. Based on the family income per person 
being more than two dollars per week exclusive 



114 THE AYOEKER AND THE STATE 

of rent, and considering tlie apparent economic 
conditions of 3,157 families, this Commission 
found that 76 per cent of them could have given 
their children the benefits of industrial training. 
Based upon the statements of the parents them- 
selves it was found that 66 per cent of the children 
of these parents could have continued in school, 
and that 55 per cent would have been willing to 
send their children to vocational schools. The ap- 
pearance of the home, of the mother and the chil- 
dren confirmed the statement of the parents and 
led the Commission to feel confident that three- 
fourths of the families could and would have per- 
mitted their children to remain in school if its 
work had appealed to them as being of economic 
value. How many times parents have said, ^ * What 
is the use of my child staying in school any longer? 
He knows how to read, write and figure, and that is 
sufficient; besides, we cannot afford to send him 
to college and he had better be working and earn- 
ing money than to while away his time in learn- 
ing things that will never do him any good." 
Teachers soon discover that the one thing that 
every parent desires is how best to make his child 
self-supporting and he wants tangible results in 
the product of the schools. 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 115 

The depth of the problem. 

It is readily seen that the problem is deeper than 
any personal whims of the child or the off-hand 
opinion of the parents. It is not enough to say 
that the present educational facilities are ample 
and that the children and parents are lacking in 
discrimination concerning their advantages; for 
the fact remains that the existing schools do not 
appeal to thousands of young people with suffi- 
cient strength to hold them until they can realize 
the whole benefit to be obtained from them. 

It must not be inferred that the public schools 
are altogether bad, that the philosophy of public 
education is false, that the practice of the schools 
is wrong. The school system is far from being a 
failure, but it must be more adequate and less 
one-sided; it must be both modified and supple- 
mented. Moreover, it must teach children the 
significance of a skilled vocation and assist them 
in exploring their capacities and their tastes and 
make provision for training them for specific use- 
fulness in some skilled vocations. 

Leaving school. 

Eecent investigations regarding the limited 
school attendance of children show clearly that 
a large portion of boys and girls are leaving 
school at or before the completion of an elementar^^ 
course of instruction, and the majority of these 



116 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

children are seeking employment in unskilled in- 
dustries to their detriment physically, mentally, 
and often morally. These facts have aroused not 
only the professional educators but the average 
layman as well. 

One of the causes of pupils leaving school is 
the lack of harmony between the child's nature 
and needs, and the curriculum. This is espe- 
cially true of our courses of instruction for the 
period of adolescence. As the child approaches 
this period he longs to do things. Instead of 
deepening and intensifying its nature at this time 
through motor activities, thus giving an outlet 
to surplus energy, we compel him to store his 
memory with words, inessential subject-matter 
and things abstract. It is an age when he longs 
to get out into the world, to accomplish something 
definite and to be paid as men are paid. Edu- 
cation for this period should be of such a char- 
acter as to hold the boy in school and thus prevent 
him from losing the benefits of previous train- 
ing. The plasticity of child nature is such that 
the school influences may work tremendous good 
or evil, for their results are likely to be perma- 
nently fixed in the character of the child. Prof. 
Paul Hanus of Harvard University, in referring 
to the continuation schools of Germany, France 
and England, says, ^*We are the only progressive 
nation which allows its adolescents — the great ma- 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 117 

jority of tliem — to drift without systematic edu- 
cational influence from the time they are fourteen 
years of age until they arrive at the threshold of 
citizenship.'' (See diagram on page 119.) 

Simplification and elimination. 

Another fact to be taken into consideration is 
the overcrowded curriculum. New subjects and 
subject-matter, important and valuable in them- 
selves, have been introduced without much refer- 
ence to their relationship to the older material. 
"We have tried to keep the old and at the same 
time make room for the new without apparently 
any conception of the sense of relationship be- 
tween the two and the interdependence of one 
subject upon another. In order to find a place 
for handwork it will be necessary to take some 
account of our educational stock, that we may 
determine the educational value of some of its 
subject-matter and the methods of presenting it. 
Very likely the most important problem to-day 
in the elementary school is the reorganization 
of the courses and methods of instruction along 
lines of simplification, elimination and readjust- 
ment of time assignments. A proper study of 
the industries might well serve as the basis of 
this readjustment. If properly carried out it 
ought to bring about more closely unified and cor- 
related courses in arithmetic, history, geography 



A Connecting Link between School and Employment. 

In this country we find children leaving school for 
employment in various industries before they are prop- 
erly prepared. A few supplement their meagre ele- 
mentary education by study in public evening schools, 
Y. M. C. A. classes, or correspondence schools. The 
solid line of the upper sketch shows the record of school 
attendance in the United States. The dotted line tells 
the story of employment — how, in some states, children 
leave school at ten years of age and go to work in the 
unskilled industries, while the majority in all states 
leave at fourteen. The school area marked (1) shows 
the splendid field of supplemental education for those 
employed but attending no school. 

The solid line in the lower sketch indicates the school 
record for Germany. With the exception that all chil- 
dren in Germany are required to stay in school until 
they are fourteen, the dotted line of employment is 
similar to the record in the United States. But the 
solid line showing the school attendance is vastly dif- 
ferent; for the great system of industrial, continuation 
and evening trade classes in Germany affords means of 
supplemental education in marked contrast to the area 
marked (2) in the United States. A comparison of the 
areas marked (2) and (3) points to the need in this 
country for some cooperative effort between the school 
and the factory. "While these sketches may not be ac- 
curately drawn they are strikingly significant of the 
new field for educational effort and illustrate the pro- 
visions made in Germany to meet a vital educational 
problem. 



118 



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120 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

and nature study through supplying a need for 
the information which we have been trying to 
impress upon the children as being valuable. 
Nothing will vitalize the study of arithmetic 
more than to create within the school itself a 
direct use for its processes. Every step in the 
development of the lesson in transportation will 
take on a new meaning when the child sees its 
relationship to the production of materials good 
for food, clothing and shelter. Only through some 
such interrelationship as has been suggested, 
can the school maintain interest in study, soli- 
darity in the knowledge acquired and efficiency 
in converting this knowledge into power. 

Choice of vocation. 

Moreover, the school must assume the re- 
sponsibility of providing such an education as 
will assist the child to determine properly what 
line of human activity he would like to fol- 
low or at which he has the requisite ability to 
succeed. As Dean Eussell of Teachers' College 
states it, ^^I would have the school help him de- 
fine the aim of his life in terms of his own nat- 
ural endowment and possible attainment. The 
child has a right to this kind of guidance; the 
school must give it, and what the school gives 
must be determined by sympathetic instruction 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 121 

along the lines leading to the goal.'' The choice 
of occupations has been left to chance. Some may 
say that the age of fourteen is too early a period 
in the life of a child to require him to select a 
line of work and to prepare himself for it. No 
one familiar with the spirit and methods of vo- 
cational training will presume to say that this 
training is to fix the child, inexorably, in one 
groove for life. We must remember, neverthe- 
less, that children do make their choice of oc- 
cupation and leave school for the mill, the store 
or the office without any knowledge of their fit- 
ness for the work or any preparation which gives 
them a broad outlook on the chosen vocation. 
The avenues of choice are open to pupils after 
they have left the school. May not avenues be 
provided for a wise selection through commer- 
cial and industrial activities within the school 
system*? 

The advantage of such training, to review 
briefly, lies in the fact that it should prevent 
drifting from one employment to another, by 
holding young people in school; awakening in 
them a new school interest by providing a larger 
amount of handwork than they now have and 
furnishing means for a wise choice of occupa- 
tions, thus contributing powerfully to their 
development. 



122 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

Types of children. 

We must realize that the kind of education 
which is best for one child is not necessarily good 
for another. Differences and variations between 
members of the same family appear early in 
childhood; moreover, different environment tends 
to accentuate and increase these variations. 
There is no absolutely fixed, unchangeable stand- 
ard of educational values which can be applied 
at all times and under all circumstances. The 
educational equation contains many unknown 
and independently varying factors. How many 
teachers meet this difference of temperament 
within the limits of a single family whose chil- 
dren have come under their supervision. The 
school will have to accept the existence of these 
manifold differentiations. It ought to recognize 
that the education which is efficient and appro- 
priate for one individual is often extremely 
wasteful when applied to another. 

In considering a plan for vocational training 
for the wasted years it is necessary to keep in 
mind several points. 

Cultural vs, vocational. 

There can be no division of education into edu- 
cation for culture and education for industry. 
It will never do in this country to establish a 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 123 

system of differentiation of school activities in 
such a way as will bring about divisions of society 
into sharply defined classes. Vocational educa- 
tion must not crowd out the opportunities for 
liberal training, nor must the pursuit of liberal 
education disqualify its pupil for vocational 
training. Dr. David Snedden, Commissioner of 
Education for Massachusetts, in recent addresses, 
has discussed most effectively the necessity of 
this combination of liberal and vocational educa- 
tion. Unconsciously, but no less unfortunately, 
we have already developed what really consti- 
tutes class education for we have worked out our 
educational scheme on the basis that those who 
could absorb the printed pages and pass success- 
ful examinations were of the ^^ elect'' and those 
who could not were only fitted to work with 
their hands. A conception unfortunately now 
current among some well-intentioned persons, 
that vocational training is for only the dull and 
stupid, will do infinite harm. Never should we 
have a system of education which deliberately 
separates those who are to work with their hands 
from those who are supposed to work with their 
brains. One time at the conclusion of a lecture 
where I had been explaining the work of a vo- 
cational school, a principal of one of the local 
schools stepped up to me and said, ^'I have just 
the boy for such a school.'' Naturally, I sup- 



124 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

posed that he referred to his own offspring. I 
soon learned that he had in mind a poor unfortu- 
nate specimen of imbecility, very large for his 
years, very backward in his grade, fourteen 
years old and spending his third year in the 
fourth grade. This school man saw in voca- 
tional training nothing but a scheme for turning 
into our industries a selected lot of material suited 
only to the requirements of an asylum for mental 
unfortunates. Such an attitude is a direct insult 
to laboring men. Industries need intelligence as 
much as commercial establishments. 

We must recognize that there are many proc- 
esses by which children can be educated, and 
one process may be best for one group and an- 
other process for a different group. But all proc- 
esses are to be in the name of education. The 
solution will only be complete when we make the 
most effective adjustment possible between in- 
dustrial and liberal training. While we are 
bound to recognize these several groups of chil- 
dren we must give each of them that training 
which will render them efficient as citizens, as pro- 
ducers and as men and women of culture within 
their individual measure of capacity and oppor- 
tunity. 

Every child possesses some strong interests 
or instincts which may be made the basis of per- 
sonal culture, and any tendency to separate work 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 125 

from culture, or culture from work, in the school 
programs may lead to a similar division in the 
program of life after leaving school. The pro- 
duction of a well-rounded industrial citizen will 
not be accomplished by so arranging a school 
program that the impressionable child obtains 
the idea that one hour he is being ^'culturized" 
and at another hour is being ^'vocationalized.'^ 
There is no man, however skilled he may become 
in his vocation, that will not need the refining and 
humanizing influences which come from a love 
of books, of art and of nature. Undoubtedly the 
greater his skill the more time he will have for 
leisure and the larger the investments he can make 
for personal culture. 

Social significance. 

Again, the subjects in these schools should be 
taught with reference to their social significance 
as well as to their vocational bearing. The child 
should feel that school studies have an impor- 
tant bearing upon life. The cost of the Panama 
Canal, the number of its workers, the years taken 
to complete it, are of little value as compared 
with a knowledge of its commercial importance 
and the method of its construction as applied to 
the lives of those who are to reap its advantages, 
as well as those who accomplish its construction. 
Likewise in the study of history it is of little im- 



126 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

portance to know the lines of battle, the dates of 
engagements or the numbers on each side; the 
important thing to society and the individual is 
the progress which was made in a movement to- 
ward the betterment of mankind and how far 
have we gone toward a government of, for and by 
the people. Arithmetical examples in taxation 
mean little if they deal with only the number of 
mills on a dollar or the number of cents per hun- 
dred of valuation. But the large questions of 
how the money is raised by taxation, what bodies 
of men spend it and are responsible for it, are 
of tremendous social significance. Again, the 
date of the invention of the cottongin and the 
name of the inventor can by no possible stretch 
of pedagogical imagination equal in social and 
industrial value a close study of the effect of 
this invention upon the life of our people in the 
way of new products, new social conditions and 
the accompanying new social and industrial order. 

General aim. 

To sum up in a word, the general aim of voca- 
tional education, for boys and girls between the 
ages of fourteen and sixteen is to render them of 
greatest advantage to the community by training 
them for practical work and by securing at the 
same time adequate development of the mind. 
Consequently, this training will not devote itself 



EDUCATION FOB WASTED YEARS 127 

entirely to the teaching of so-called industrial 
subjects. Principles of citizenship, history of 
the country's achievements, mathematics, lan- 
guage and other general knowledge will find a 
lodging within the curriculum of these schools. 
Industrial training should not begin until after 
the ordinary school subjects like reading, writing, 
spelling, drawing, arithmetic and the rudiments 
of history, geography and nature study are fairly 
completed. Neither should it begin until after 
the pupil is ready to handle the lighter tools of 
industry safely and to acquire skill in their use. 
From one-third to one-half of the school session 
should be devoted to those studies which will 
bring about an appreciative understanding of the 
resources and problems of our civilization and 
the power to deal effectively with them. Such a 
program will result in the children's knowing 
something about many things and a good deal 
about something. By one they may earn a living ; 
by the other they are expected to live a life of 
completeness. For within the measure of in- 
dividual capacity and opportunity these boys and 
girls are to be, not only efficient producers, but 
also useful citizens and persons of culture. 

Length of course. 

The length of course will necessarily vary in 
different localities. It will depend upon the eco- 



128 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

nomic pressure of the families concerned, the 
status of the existing school system and the 
nature of the local industries. A study of child 
labor laws in the country shows a marked differ- 
ence in the state of public enlightenment regard- 
ing the value of schooling as expressed in law. 
Those states which place the limit of compulsory 
education at twelve years of age can hardly ex- 
pect to have their consciousness aroused in a min- 
ute to the need of a four year vocational course. 
The children of such communities will be for- 
tunate if they are provided with even a two year 
course of vocational training. Eventually we 
may expect that in a country as economically re- 
sourceful as America, the age of entering upon 
industry for all children may yet be raised to six- 
teen. 

Arousing industrial interests. 

The growing power of children is greatest and 
their earning power least between the ages of- 
twelve and sixteen. At the same time it must be 
kept in mind that real trade training can hardly 
be given until the boy or girl is sixteen. In gen- 
eral, the years from fourteen to sixteen should 
be given to laying the foundation of industrial 
efficiency and to arousing a set of industrial 
interests that will demand the work of the next 
two years, or from sixteen to eighteen, for their 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 129 

fulfillment. In otlier words, general vocational 
training for the first two years and specialization 
the last two years. By the time the child is six- 
teen he should have developed an interest in in- 
dustrial subjects and should have determined 
the line of mechanical work for which he is best 
fitted. Then at sixteen he should fit himself for 
a trade pursuit. Under ordinary conditions the 
period of vocational training between fourteen 
and sixteen must necessarily be limited to its ele- 
mentary or unspecialized forms of expression. 
The general nature of the industrial work will 
give the general intelligence and adaptability 
which are so much desired by employers. It is 
possible to organize the majority of specialized 
occupations into a number of groups, each one 
of which represents certain distinctive rudi- 
mentary processes connected with common ma- 
terials. These general processes will later admit 
of subdivision in the various activities which go 
toward making up the highly specialized indus- 
tries. 

Scheme of instruction. 

Assuming that the course of study of the first 
six years of the elementary school has contained 
its fair proportion of manual arts, the vocational 
training corresponding to the seventh and eighth 
grades will lay added emphasis on hand skill. 



130 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

With this handwork there will be offered related 
lessons in English, geography, history, physics, 
arithmetic and drawing. The demands of indus- 
trial life and not a traditional school course will 
determine the nature of the shop course. Six 
hours of instruction each day is none too long and 
the program of study can be so arranged by al- 
ternating theory and practice as to prevent the 
work's becoming fatiguing. Everyone knows 
that these children would be working nine to ten 
hours a day in some mill or store if they were not 
in school. In order to avoid the dissipation of 
attention and energy which now obtains through 
many subjects and many periods, the school day 
should not be divided into short periods. Appli- 
cation should be taught before theory and the 
pupils will learn only the essentials of subject- 
matter. 

General intelligence is to be acquired through 
a coordination of industrial work with academic 
classes. (See diagram on page 133.) It is not 
necessary to eliminate any important book studies, 
but these should be industrialized and socialized 
for the sake of economy of effort and better under- 
standing. As the industrial work for boys and 
girls is different, it precludes any attempt at giv- 
ing classes of boys and those of girls exactly the 
same treatment in any subject. 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 131 

The ''hoohivork/' 

Without going too much into details, the Eng- 
lish will aim to develop wholesome tastes in prac- 
tical people and enable them to give plain and 
forcible expression to thought. English compo- 
sition will provide much practice in writing busi- 
ness forms, including letters of all kinds, also 
theme writing for practice in simple direct ex- 
pression of ideas formed through experience. A 
command of English is as much a tool of a trade 
for the prospective cabinetmaker as his plane. 
It should be the simple, direct sort of English, 
both written and oral, in which workers give and 
take directions. The work in arithmetic will be 
of the sort that gives power and knowledge. It 
will aim at accuracy and speed in the funda- 
mental operations, power in simple mental calcu- 
lations, mastery of common fractions and deci- 
mals, facility in practical applications of the ta- 
bles of weights and measures, and finally, ac- 
quaintance with business forms and customs as 
found in shops and stores. For the boys, arith- 
metic will find its applications in such problems 
as deal with the speed of machines, weights of 
castings, percentages of alloys, the subject-mat- 
ter depending of course on the leading industries 
of the locality. For the girls, there will be the 
treatment of household accounts including cost 
of food, fuel, service, rent and typical family 



A graphical view of inter-relations. 

An industrial school must be organized in accordance 
with the leading purpose. This purpose may center 
around a chosen trade or group of trades. The organ- 
ization of subject-matter in such a school may possibly 
be made clear by considering a diagram modeled after 
a cart wheel. 

In the position of the spokes as shown it is assumed 
that "handwork" is being taught, but the pupil can- 
not study the subject properly unless it comes within 
proper relation with science and mathematics. These 
subjects like the spokes of the wheel must bear a part 
of the load. At the same time other subjects such as 
geography, language and history, are under a reaction 
much as in the case of the upper spokes of the wheel. 

As new subjects come into vertical position, each one 
becomes in turn a center of effort but related to all the 
others and always connected with the leading purpose. 



i 



132 



INTERRELATIOH OF SUBJECTS IN THE 
VOCATIONAL SCHOOLS 




133 . 



134 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

budgets. The history and civics will have for 
their general idea the development of the indus- 
trial citizen and consequently will lay the em- 
phasis upon the industrial or economic phenom- 
ena of our national development rather than upon 
its political and military aspects. Stress will 
naturally be laid upon the development of trans- 
portation and communication, the establishment 
and growth of cities together with their new code 
of civic life, the changes brought about by the 
concentration of capital and labor in production, 
and the civic duties and privileges of the modern 
industrial citizen. The educational content of 
facts concerning industrial and economic devel- 
opment is greater than that of facts relating to 
wars, boundaries of states, or development of 
political parties. The geography will center 
about collections similar to those furnished by 
the Philadelphia Museum of the raw materials 
of commerce such as may be gathered and classi- 
fied by the pupils. The collections may be, for 
the most part, put up in glass bottles of suitable 
size, and illustrated by cuts from magazines 
which show the processes of their production and 
their preparation for commercial use. Textiles, 
gums, minerals, oils, woods, leather, rubber, 
threads, etc. may be shown both in their native 
forms and in the various stages of their manu- 
facture. When geography and nature study are 



< 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 135 

thus centered around the commercial products of 
the world it is readily seen that they become con- 
crete, stimulating and broadening, while at the 
same time they make the pupil intelligent con- 
cerning the industries of mankind as a whole. 
The geography of the world should be taught in 
the products and imports of the locality, through 
the materials used in the school. The work in 
science will be necessarily differentiated accord- 
ing to sex interests. The boys will study ele- 
mentary physics, mechanics and electricity with 
reference to their practical application to the 
machinery in the school and in the locality. 
Meanwhile, the girls will give attention to that 
portion of science which comes under the terms 
of sanitation arid household management, as, for 
example, the various types of plumbing fixtures, 
the action of alkalis and the removal of stains. 

The ^'practical work/' 

The handwork for boys differs from what is 
ordinarily the conception of manual training. 
However valuable a limited amount of handwork 
may be for general educational purposes, it re- 
mains true that to give but one and one-half 
hours a week to such work is to make it more of 
an entertainment than an industrial training. 
The time is too short to achieve the needed skill, 
or to lay the foundation of enduring industrial 



136 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

interests. In the vocational school from three to 
five half days per week will be devoted to snch 
training. The skill and knowledge that will be 
thus acquired and the interests that are estab- 
lished will go far toward making both parent and 
pupil see the desirability of additional years in 
school in order that there may be a better prepa- 
ration for industrial life. It is expected that the 
handwork will center around direct applications 
to the local industries. There will be sheet metal 
work, tinsmithing, soldering, gas piping, metal 
spinning, electric wiring and speed lathe work, 
both in metals and wood. The handwork will be 
in accordance with the best shop practice. Such 
a course should cultivate habits of close observa- 
tion, a high ideal of what constitutes honesty in 
workmanship, habits of accuracy and industry, 
knowledge of materials and types of construc- 
tion best adapted to a given purpose and skill in 
the care of tools and their use in industrial proc- 
esses. 

On the practical side, the course for girls will 
include household arts, sewing, millinery and 
garment making, freehand drawing and design. 
Through such a course the girls will be led to be- 
come economic and useful homemakers, besides 
having the training which will allow them to fill 
positions as milliners and dressmakers' appren- 
tices. Interests in other vocational pursuits may 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 137 

be aroused as need of preparation for them ap- 
pears. In brief, the practical work will teach 
the girls to care for the house ; sweep, dust, clean 
windows and paint, build a fire and take care of 
the stove, sink and tables; to cook simple nutri- 
tious dishes in family quantities and to buy the 
ingredients of these dishes; to serve a simple 
meal and know something of its nutritive value, 
expense and fitness; to wash and iron the gar- 
ments made in the sewing classes, the aprons 
worn for school work and the towels, table mats, 
and curtains used in the house. 

The drawing will lay its emphasis not upon 
representation — i. e., the mere copying of works 
of art or of the picturing of objects of nature or 
manufacture, but upon inventive design, both in 
freehand and mechanical drawing. The indus- 
trial drawing will aim constantly at the graph- 
ical expression of original creation rather than 
even the most faithful imitation. In this way 
the student will be best prepared for all those 
forms of drawing that later find their true appli- 
cation in the various practical arts and handi- 
crafts. 

For the boys the drawing will consist of the 
practical application of mechanical and freehand 
work to parts of machinery, house plans, etc. 
Emphasis will be placed upon the reading of 
drawings, making sketches of machine parts 



138 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

quickly and accurately and upon having all school 
drawings in accord with modern drawing room 
practice. For the girls the drawing course will 
attempt to apply the simple principles of design 
and color to the work in the other classes. 

The girls will design and stencil curtains for 
the dining and sewing rooms and will make de- 
signs for doilies for the table. They will plan 
attractive spacing of tucks, ruffles and embroid- 
ery for underwear and will select combinations 
of color and trimmings for dresses. They will 
also make designs for articles used in the house 
such as candle shades, pillow covers and the like. 
These designs will be executed in their other 
classes. 

A record of graduates. 

Fortunately, one can turn to the records of sev- 
eral schools that furnish evidence of the value of 
such training as outlined. The Hebrew Techni- 
cal Institute, New York City, was founded in 
1884. It takes boys who are fourteen years of 
age, who have completed the seventh grade of the 
public schools, and offers a three years' course in 
shop and book work. All the boys pursue the 
same course for two years, specializing during 
the last year in woodworking, metal working, 
electricity, drawing, etc. The following table of 
occupations of the 782 living graduates shows 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 139 

most conclusively the nature of their training and 
their success in accomplishment : 

Pattern and model makers 4 per cent. 

Machinists 7 

Instrument makers and general mechanics 10 

Electricians and electrical mechanics 16 

Draughtsmen 16 

Architects 4 

Manufacturers 2 

Foremen and superintendents 11 

Forty-two per cent of the graduates who have been out of the 
school ten years or more have risen to be foremen, superintendents, 
managers, or proprietors. 

Teachers and students 5 per cent. 

Clerical positions 19 *' 

Eeports not received ■. 6 " 

Their average weekly income as reported on the eve of tha 
twenty-fifth anniversary of the school, is significant: 

_ , Present 

-^ - » Present 

Number of _ , average 

Deceased. averaare , , 

graduates. ® weekly 

^ * income. 

1886 19 2 39 $50.00 

1888 11 1 38 38.00 

1889 17 I 37 40.00 

1890 16 1 36 50.00 

1891 19 - 35 42.00 

1892 35 4 34 35.00 

1893 26 2 33 32.00 

1894 31 - 32 37.00 

1895 33 2 31 37.00 

1896 34 1 30 38.00 

1897 19 2 29 35.00 

1898 30 - 28 29.00 



140 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

Number of Present Present. 

graduates. * average average 

age. weekly 
income. 

1899 31 4 27 29.00 

1900 35 - 26 28.00 

1901 40 - 25 26.00 

1902 34 - 24 24.00 

1903 46 2 23 20.00 

1904 62 - 22 18.00 

1905 63 - 21 17.00 

1906 59 1 20 12.00 

1907 73 - 19 10.25 

1908 82 1 18 7.25 

Total number of graduates 805 ; deceased 24. 

An experiment with girls. 

Several years ago the Principal of the Han- 
cock School, Boston, made an investigation of 
the life work upon which the girls of her school 
entered. She found that many did not enter em- 
ployments which contributed to their develop- 
ment in any sense of the word, either physically, 
morally or intellectually, but that they drifted 
about from one unskilled occupation to another, 
gaining little or nothing in efficiency and never 
becoming able to earn a respectable living; yet 
they continued to leave her school, ** merely stay- 
ing until the day they were fourteen that they 
might rush into some kind of work.^' She felt 
that the introduction of a larger amount of in- 
dustrial work related more closely to the girPs 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 141 

life either for future work or for horae living, 
might arouse a new interest in school and aid in a 
wiser choice of occupation than otherwise would 
be possible. With this in view, fifty girls were 
selected from the seventh, eighth and ninth 
grades. All were given a choice between their 
regular afternoon school program and the indus- 
trial work at the North Bennet Street Industrial 
School. The attempt was made to arrange the 
program so that as much as possible of the heav- 
ier work, arithmetic, geography, history, Eng- 
lish, reading and literature, should come in the 
forenoon, while some of the reading and per- 
sonal hygiene and gymnastics were to be included 
in the afternoon period in the industrial school. 

The courses in housekeeping, sewing and de- 
sign were similar to those previously outlined. 
In all three of these activities no opportunity 
was lost to apply the bookwork of the morning 
program and to emphasize its use. There was 
constant practice in measurements and in esti- 
mates of cost in both sewing and cooking. In 
writing recipes and describing processes used in 
the work the writing and composition were criti- 
cized for use of good English and good spelling. 
A greater freedom for conversation in the work- 
room made possible helpful lessons in the correct 
use of spoken English. 

That the girls became more keenly interested 



142 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

in school work and thus remained in it a longer 
period after their fourteenth birthday is at least 
evident from the result obtained from the first 
class of fifty girls. Twelve of the eighth grade 
girls reached the age of fourteen during this 
year. Two of them left school — one went to 
work and the other wanted to continue with her 
industrial class but preferred to leave the public 
school. Out of the eight girls of the seventh 
grade who reached the age of fourteen during 
the year, three left to go to work. Two of these 
claimed that they would go on with the industrial 
class if they could. Of thirteen sixth grade girls 
who reached fourteen, three went to work, but one 
of these, after several weeks of absence, reen- 
tered public school and came back to the indus- 
trial class. 

It was hoped that the school might help the 
girls to determine more intelligently their future 
work and to direct them into a higher grade of 
occupations. It seems to have served this pur- 
pose, for when the class first went to the indus- 
trial school the eighth grade girls were asked 
what they intended to do after graduation, and 
the returns showed only three out of the twenty 
planned to go to high school — the others plan- 
ning to go to work or to remain at home. Shortly 
before the school year closed the Principal asked 
the girls to answer certain questions with refer- 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 143 

ence to plans for next year — among them the fol- 
lowing: Do you expect to go to high school next 
year! If not, and there were a school where you 
could go to learn more about dressmaking, milli- 
nery, cooking, etc. would you go? The returns 
showed that seven intended going to high school, 
one to business college, eleven who would go on 
for more industrial work, and two who did not 
know. To further test the value of the work 
each pupil was asked to write a paper, and 
among other things, to state frankly how she felt 
the industrial class had helped her and to say 
which interested her more — the public school or 
the industrial school, and why. They were urged 
to give their honest opinions and were assured 
that no marks would be given them on the papers 
but that by speaking freely they might help the 
teachers to determine the sort of work which 
would be profitable to the girls in the last years 
of school. The answers were helpful. In a few 
cases the girl favored public school, because it 
prepared for a commercial school where one 
might become a typewriter and enter an office 
rather than a workshop. In nine-tenths of the 
papers the pathetic expression was used, ^'the 
public school studies help us to graduate;'^ and 
the comparison was made that the industrial 
course would help them to earn a living, to be 
useful at home and to know better how to buy 



144 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

and prepare food and clothing. There was only 
one dissenting voice regarding their enjoyment 
of the class and all expressed the willingness to 
remain in school if more of such work were given. 

An end to bring about. 

The school — ^vocational or general — -mnst help 
every child to grasp his best chance. To do this 
it must know for what it is aiming and must 
have a better understanding of the principles 
which it is trying to carry out. Every child 
must have an elementary education and before 
everything else this education must mean the 
power to read and write and master the simple 
processes of figuring. Its work must have a 
definite aim and its ends must be assured. Be- 
fore a child is permitted to leave school it should 
be known that he has a definite possession which 
can never be taken from him. 

The work of the school must be more intensive 
and at the same time simpler and more definite. 
It is wrong to waste the time of a child. More- 
over, it is unwise to attempt to impart mere in- 
formation. If the child has the elements which 
give him the power to get this information, he 
will get it when he needs it or when he wants it. 
'For example, the use of the metric system is 
merely a matter of ten mbiutes ' study when it is 
needed in life provided the individual has the 



EDUCATION FOR WASTED YEARS 145 

power of applying a simple rule of moving the 
decimal point and the understanding of the 
table of metric measures. 

The child must be given the opportunity to 
learn a vocation after he has acquired the simpler 
work of the elementary school as outlined. The 
school system must j^rovide schools that train for 
every vocation for which there is a reasonable de- 
mand. And in one of these the child must re- 
main until there is ground for believing that he 
has found the calling for which nature and his 
own effort have prepared him. 

He must know that he is not to drop out and 
not to be allowed to waste his time. The schools 
must carry him as far as they can be of help to 
him under the conditions of his life. Moreover, 
he must get the larger part of his culture through 
his work. It will be a finer and truer culture 
than can be gained in any other way. Culture 
which comes through mere instruction is good, 
but it is secondary and must wait upon the essen- 
tials. 

The real test of the value of vocational train- 
ing will be that it shall make the boys and girls 
free to advance to higher positions and not 
leave them tied forever to a cog of the vast in- 
dustrial system. It is not only the type of train- 
ing that will get the boy or girl into the job that 
is wanted but that which will enable him to get 



146 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

out of that job into a better one in the same line 
of business. The training mnst be broad enough 
to train the head, heart and hand to individual 
and social needs. For the school period of a 
child's life between the age of fourteen and six- 
teen, his supreme need is for a series of inter- 
esting school occupations. This need the hand- 
work can meet to a large degree. In order that 
the period after school life may not suffer from 
a lack of wholesome interests vocational train- 
ing must include that which will enable each 
child to appreciate and develop in himself some 
aspects of personal culture. 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 

LONG ago Carlyle said that the proper theme 
for an epic was no longer ^^arms and the 
man" but *^ tools and the man.'' To-day in the 
educational world, at least, we need to be re- 
minded that in our intellectual fervor we have 
forgotten the hand. But threatened commercial 
invasion from foreign shores, a realization of 
the scarcity of skilled labor, the specialized tool 
with its over-specialized man, new educational 
ideals and methods, have driven us again to rec- 
ognize the value of the tool and the man as an 
instrument of civic and economic growth. In 
slighting the hand in education we have neg- 
lected the man. In our comparatively new and 
over-fed nation, the oversight has in the past pro- 
duced but little harm, for the competition of the 
world has not been felt within our borders and 
an over-indulgent Nature has made it possible 
for us to ignore the baneful effects of such an 
inadequate conception of education. We have 
been very happy-go-lucky over our educational 
creeds. We have assumed that learning was 

147 



148 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

meant for brain workers only. If a man was to 
be a lawyer or a physician or a clergyman then 
he must be educated, but if he was to follow busi- 
ness or trade then he needed only to know a 
few of the elements of learning and then to en- 
trust himself to a kind Providence or chance to 
guide him to his destiny. The old notion of 
schools has emphasized books not boys, and it 
has tended toward letters not toward living. 

Work dignified. 

Only recently have we brought ourselves to 
see that the industrial worker needs social rec- 
ognition; that, through educational activities, 
society should testify that his work is worth 
while. To give special training to the two mil- 
lions of people engaged in the professions and to 
provide no specific training for the thirty mil- 
lions engaged in productive work in this country, 
has been to cast a slur upon manual labor. This 
lack of special education has practically pointed 
out to these workers that they were engaged in 
a life's work which was not worthy of being dig- 
nified by education. We have been assuming 
that while it was necessary to train in a technical 
college the man who designed the machine, it was 
not essential that the man who made it was in 
need of special training. The same has been 
true regarding professional training. To im- 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 149 

ply that the doctor who cured the disease, brought 
on perhaps through poor sanitation, needed 
eight years of elementary schooling, eight years 
in high school and college, in addition to six 
years in a medical school and hospital, to fit him 
for his profession, and that the plumber, perhaps 
responsible for this unsanitary condition, needed 
but six years of elementary school work, devoid 
of all practical training as well as of all scien- 
tific facts relating to his trade, has been to place 
before the eye of the worker a wrong aspect of 
the value of his calling. 

Genuine respect for labor. 

We have talked much about the- dignity of 
labor, meaning thereby manual labor, while at 
the same time we have so worked out our educa- 
tional policy as if we regarded education as a mat- 
ter of the head only. The result has been that a 
great many of our people, themselves the sons 
of men who worked with their hands, seem to 
think that they rise in the world if they get into 
a position where they do no hard manual work 
whatever; where their hands will grow soft and 
their working clothes will be kept clean. While 
there are some kinds of labor where the work 
must be purely mental, and there are other kinds 
of labor where, unfortunately, under existing 
conditions, very little demand indeed is made 



150 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

upon the mind, it remains true that the bulk of 
the people should do work which makes demands 
upon both the body and the mind. To provide 
in our public schools for the trained mind in a 
trained body is to show that as a nation we have 
a true conception of the dignity and importance 
of labor. The calling of the agriculturist, the 
calling of the skilled mechanic, should alike be 
recognized as professions, just as emphatically 
as the callings of lawyer, of doctor and of clergy- 
man. Our young people should be trained 
both in head and in hand and they should get 
over the idea — to quote Theodore Eoosevelt — 
^Hhat to earn twelve dollars a week and call it 
'salary' is better than to earn twenty-five dollars 
a week and call it 'wages.' " Every parent 
wants his boy ''to do better than he did and not 
work so hard." This is a laudable ambition and 
is typical of American life. But the parent often 
spoils the fine sentiment by his next statement, 
"My boy is never to work in the factory; as I 
have; he must get into a respectable calling." 

Educational point of view. 

In the entire process of education three 
species of emphasis may be distinguished. 
First, the personal emphasis, that which con- 
cerns the pupil alone. From this point of 
view, education is to be valued as develop- 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 151 

ing and equi23ping the individual to make 
the most of life, to confer upon him self-com- 
mand, to give intelligent understanding of the 
world of nature and of men and women. Sec- 
ond, the civic emphasis, which includes all that 
seeks to enable individuals to satisfy the right- 
ful demands of the state, which insists that cit- 
izens be intelligent, moral and self-supporting 
and that they so develop the civic conscience that 
the state will be safe in their hands. Third, the 
vocational emphasis, that part of education that 
has to do consciously and exclusively with the 
individuaPs trade, calling or professional career. 
There is no intention of conveying the impression 
that these interests are to be treated by three dis- 
tinct educational procedures, nor even that they 
are at any point completely separable, nor that 
one of these can be intelligently promoted with- 
out at the same time promoting the others; it is 
nevertheless true that at times we are regard- 
ing the welfare of the boy or girl ; at other times 
we are thinking of the schools in relation to pub- 
lic welfare; at still other times we are chiefly 
concerned with training boys and girls for their 
careers. So without intending to relegate to the 
background any idea of personal culture or civic 
relations of these boys and girls, it is the pur- 
pose of this chapter to discuss vocational educa- 
tion more from the standpoint of the economic 



152 THE WOEKER AND THE STATE 

welfare of the state, its industries and its work- 
ers, than from the point of view which concerns 
the pnpil alone. Other portions of this book 
have dealt generously with those phases of vo- 
cational training which consider the personal 
needs of the young workers and at this time the 
economic phases of the subject deserve some spe- 
cial attention. 

An economic consideration. 

No nation is so blessed as ours as regards 
agriculture, commerce and manufactures. We 
lead the world in all except commerce; we are 
the wealthiest people in the world, partly for the 
reason that we have an abundance of natural re- 
sources and partly because we had as our early 
settlers men of great vigor and resourcefulness. 
All young nations having the great advantage 
of plenty of raw materials are enabled to ad- 
vance rapidly in special directions. As a nation 
increases in wealth and productive ability its 
natural resources are reduced and more depen- 
dence has to be placed upon an economical use of 
its natural gifts. Especial attention must be 
paid to the best possible use of the means at 
hand. The older the nation, the more congested 
becomes the population of the cities and the 
greater becomes the question how the people 
shall live intelligently and support themselves. 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 153 

The unprecedented growth of our population, 
its rapid concentration into towns and cities, the 
profound changes in our social and industrial 
conditions and the enormously increased facili- 
ties for intercourse with other nations have laid 
new duties ui3on the present generation. Po- 
litically, the Monroe Doctrine may hold good, but 
from the commercial standpoint it is a dead 
letter. We are participating in world-wide com- 
petition, and if the nation is to satisfy its am- 
bitions, meet its required privileges, it must be 
equipped with every resource which education 
can supply. 

Our foreign trade. 

That we are not indifferent to foreign trade is 
evident from every trade and consular report; 
but, much as we desire to obtain it, we can never 
succeed except by exporting at low prices su- 
perior articles made by skilled workmen. We 
may attempt to hold our own markets by high 
tariff, but articles ''made in Germany" will con- 
tinue to be exhibited in our store windows. The 
''Yellow peril" is now confined to Japanese labor 
in California, but visiting commissions from 
Japan, studying our methods of manufacture and 
buying our machinery, foretell a commercial peril 
of even greater importance. The great inter- 
national wars of the future will not be fought 



154 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

with Dreadnaughts and air ships but with steam 
ships and intricate machinery. As a nation of 
producers, we must face the armies of skilled pro- 
ducers from abroad; we must match brain with 
brain and hand with hand. 

Raw materials vs, finished products. 

This is not saying that we have not already 
accomplished much in the way of supplying the 
markets of the world; but we are sending abroad 
too much raw material to be made into manu- 
factured products while we buy great quantities 
of finished products made from our own raw ma- 
terial. We consume 75% of the things we make 
and we consume, besides, great quantities of 
things made in other countries. For example, 
to quote from address of S. P. Orth at the dedi- 
cation of the Cleveland Technical High School, 
^^In 1907 we exported $1,853,718,034 worth of 
products. Of this amount $513,054,836 or 28% 
was food stuffs, $593,145,135 or 32% was raw ma- 
terial for manufacture, $259,442,028 or 14% was 
partially manufactured material to be used in fur- 
ther manufacture, while only $480,681,423 or 26% 
was manufactured ready for consumption.'^ 

We are a great nation and need no reminder 
of the fact. But to be greater and wiser re- 
quires some study and forethought. While we 
have but 5% of the world's population we pro- 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 155 

duce 25% of the world's gold, 33% of its coal, 
38% of its silver, 40% of its iron, 42% of its 
steel, 52% of its petroleum, 55% of its copper, 
and between 70 and 75% of its cotton. Now 
there are three ways in which we can dispose of 
this wealth of natural resources. First, we can 
let other countries manufacture from our raw 
products and then we can buy the finished arti- 
cles from them, paying the expense of the prod- 
uct's trip across the ocean, forward and back, 
as well as giving those countries a large bonus 
for manufacturing them for us. Second, we can 
import foreign mechanics, employ their skill in 
our mills, build up other mills for them, and en- 
able them after a few years, to take the best in- 
dustrial positions ; in short to hand over our 
great industries to the foreign-born. Third, we 
can educate our own children to shape these ma- 
terials into finished fabrics and to become sellers 
of those articles to the rest of the world instead 
of buyers. Obviously the third plan must appeal 
to every American citizen. 

The raw product. 

The statistics relating to our exports are de- 
ceitful to the lay reader who looks for dollar 
signs instead of studying the nature of the arti- 
cles exported. It is no more to our credit to 
export such vast quantities of corn and cotton 



156 THE WOKKER AND THE STATE 

and copper and crude oil than it is to the indi- 
vidual farmer to sell his fodder instead of feed- 
ing it. We would call the farmer a fool, who, in 
addition to selling his feed, also mined and sold 
the soil of his meadow. To the extent that we, 
as a nation, sell our raw products instead of 
utilizing them for our own industrial develop- 
ment, we are in the same class. This point is 
clearly brought out in the following table which 
shows the principal articles of importation into 
Germany from the United States, according to 
German statistics for the calendar year 1908; 

Bank. Articles. Value. 

1. Kaw cotton $91,045,000 

2. Copper and manufactures 43,759,000 

3. Wheat 29,323,000 

4. Lard 22,675,000 

5. Mineral oils 18,480,000 

6. Hides and skins 9,910,000 

7. Wood and manufactures 9,452,000 

8. Oilcake 7,626,000 

9. Carbonate of lime 7,200,000 

10. Oleomargarine 4,635,000 

11. Turpentine 4,621,000 

12. Cottonseed oil 3,534,000 

13. Dried fruits 3,225,000 

14. Bran 3,158,000 

15. Mowing machines 3,060,000 

In comparison with the above table it is interest- 
ing to note the nature of the principal articles of 
importation into the United States from Ger- 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 157 

many according to United States statistics for 
the same year ; 

Rank. Articles. Value. 

1. Chemicals, drugs and dyes $19,366,000 

2. Cotton and manufactures 18,037,000 

3. Paper and manufactures 7,817,000 

4. Silk and manufactures 7,411,000 

5. Toys 6,518,000 

6. Furs and manufactures 5,515,000 

7. Earthen, stone and china ware 5,287,000 

8. Iron, steel and manufactures 4,995,000 

9. Beet sugar 4,806,000 

10. Leather and manufactures 4,653,000 

11. Wool and manufactures 4,610,000 

12. Hides and skins 3,415,000 

13. Fertilizers 3,336,000 

14. India rubber and manufactures 3,166,000 

15. Wood and manufactures 2,606,000 

Moreover, the increase between 1899 and 1909 
in the trade between the United States and Ger- 
many is stated to be 80.8 per cent while the in- 
crease in value of exports from the United States 
to Germany is but 53.2 per cent. 

The American spirit. 

However, no one should gain the impression 
that our goods have no place; for American ma- 
chinery, hardware, cutlery and other iron and 
steel products, in common with some other prod- 
ucts, have an enormous sale in foreign lands, 
the point merely being that too many of our ex- 



158 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

ports are raw materials. We have done much 
towards conquering the markets of the world and 
there must have been some basis for this ac- 
complishment. In the main, it has been due to 
our cheap raw materials combined with the aid 
of the most ingenious labor-saving machinery 
and the rapid development of cheap transporta- 
tion. We have taken all these advantages and 
coupled them together with a natural genius for 
industrial combination and coordination. We 
have understood better than any other people 
how to do things on a large scale, how to take 
advantage of the economics of combination. But 
the days of lavish waste are rapidly coming to 
an end. Soon we will no longer be able to fall 
back upon the virgin resources of an imdefiled 
continent. The rapid growth of our population 
and its tendency cityward indicate that we are 
growing into an old country. In its wake, the 
vast procession of population must bring national 
conservation and personal frugality. As Frank 
A. Vanderlip of the National City Bank has put 
it, ''Lavish supplies of raw material will not 
alone permanently command those markets. In- 
genious labor-saving machinery can be duplicated. 
There are no international patent rights on effi- 
cient industrial organization.'' 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 159 

The next step. 

One of these days the whole nation will be led 
to see that in the haste of our marvelonsly suc- 
cessful industrial development we have lost sight 
of the fact that in the new industrial order which 
we have evolved we have left no place for a 
broad and adequate training for our industrial 
workers and unless we provide that training we 
will suddenly find our whole industrial structure 
standing on an insecure foundation. The sys- 
tem of machine production recognized as the 
American system of industry, is essentially of 
such a character that it cannot entirely meet the 
problem of providing adequate training for its 
workers. Such training then must be found out- 
side of the industry itself. The next step in edu- 
cation is clearly in the direction of building up 
a great system of public trade schools. What- 
ever the development of such a system may cost, 
the failure to develop it will in the end be more 
costly. In the long run it must be true that the 
industry which will command the markets of the 
world, will be the one in which the workers com- 
bine with general intelligence the broadest 
technical knowledge and the widest technical skill. 
In the end, one of the great cornerstones of trade 
supremacy must be a body of industrial workers 
intelligently trained to accomplish with the great- 
est efficiency the desired results. 



160 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

Factors in production. 

An observant economist has indicated that the 
productivity of capital depends on five fac- 
tors: first, on scientific mastery of the laws of 
natural forces and materials; second, on the in- 
vention and use of the most perfect tools, ma- 
chines and technical processes; third, on the 
perfection of the organization and discipline of 
the factory, mill or shop; fourth, on the selec- 
tion of raw materials and arrangement of the 
plan of manufacture; fifth, on the health, energy, 
intelligence and hearty cooperation of the work- 
men. 

This last factor — the most important of all — 
has been too much neglected in our country. 

When the manufacturer needs a leader or a 
particularly skilful workman for some new line 
of effort he finds that he can turn only to a band 
of specialized workmen who have been trained to 
one thing and never have had any experience at 
anything else. He cannot find this skill unless he 
happens to possess an exceptional man who has 
learned other operations in spite of the diffi- 
culties that have prevented the ordinary man 
from getting out of his rut. Obviously the man- 
ufacturer is just as much at a disadvantage from 
the present system as the worker himself. Ger- 
many did not awaken to its industrial opportun- 
ities until after the Franco-Prussian war, and at 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 161 

that time England and America had advanced a 
long way. The German mind, however, saw the 
inherent weakness of the industrial system of the 
English speaking people, and by establishing a 
complete system of industrial training, was able 
to march toward the front in the industrial world 
until it has taken practically all of the South 
American trade from England and this country. 

Adaptability of labor. 

It becomes after all merely a question as to 
whether the worker has the requisite adaptabil- 
ity to adjust himself to new industrial conditions. 
One hardly needs to recall past industrial changes 
which have so modified old processes of manufac- 
ture that there was an immediate call for workers 
who had the requisite manual adaptability and in- 
telligence to keep pace with the growth of in- 
dustrialism. We cannot change the position of 
the machinist, because the laws of business or- 
ganization compel specialization. But the ma- 
chinist can be so fitted for his occupation, that 
when the exigencies of the shop demand the 
finding of a new foreman, his mind is already 
awakened to the principles of the business far 
beyond the routine of the single operation to 
which he may have devoted all his manual labor 
while in the shop. 

A proper trade training would incite the 



162 THE WOKKER AND THE STATE 

worker to keep in touch with all the phases of 
related work so that when the time comes for 
advancement he can be one of the candidates for 
the higher position. This is meant to apply to 
the average boy, for there are a few who are al- 
ways so alive to their opportunities that, with 
education or not, they are bound to push to the 
front on their own initiative. Even the average 
man, however, should thus have a better chance 
— not a certainty, but a chance to get out of the 
rut and into the road of promotion. As Mark 
Twain once said, ^^ Training is everything. The 
peach was once a bitter almond; cauliflower is 
nothing but cabbage with a college education.'' 

An imaginary difficulty. 

While we can do nothing better than to an- 
alyze the problem of trade schools, we can do 
nothing worse than to stop with our analysis. 
Someone will raise the question, ^^But if we train 
every boy to learn a trade and to have adapta- 
bility, who will do the ordinary manual labor!'' 
In other words, some express the fear that there 
is an economic danger in educating mechanics, 
not only because they will force other men out of 
employment but also because the laboring man 
and woman will be far too good for laborer's 
work. Such a point of view is too academic for 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 163 

it must be remembered that science is steadily 
sweeping away all the humbler classes of em- 
ployment. Few men have now to toil up ladders 
with the hod of bricks upon their shoulders. 
The donkey engine does the purely animal part 
of the work. The reaper is replaced by the ma- 
chine and the plowman is rapidly receding as 
the steam plow makes its appearance. Outside 
of eastern countries, we rarely see long lines of 
men, laden with coal bags, running up planks as 
in the olden days in our ports. Just imagine, if 
ships had still to be moved by galley rowers, 
what millions would be doomed to beastlike toil. 
Of course some parts of the domain of unreflec- 
tive labor will long be left untouched, but the 
process is going forward. It is clear that while 
education is rendering the toilers dissatisfied with 
the humblest sorts of occupations, science is 
steadily sweeping away these occupations. It is 
clear that it has by no means conquered the whole 
domain. There is still much scrubbing of floors 
done by men and women on bended knees ; 
and coal is still hewn out with pick and ax and 
the use of muscle, with but little use of brains. 
Science never works by revolution, but by pro- 
gression. If we give to science a reasonable 
time it should leave us little of that labor which 
is not coupled with mental effort. 



164 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

Evolution of employments. 

If science is abolishing occupations at the 
lower end of the scale, it is creating new ones at 
the top. Think of the hundreds of thousands of 
men in America who are now employed in call- 
ings that had no existence sixty years ago: the 
telegraphers, linotypers, electricians, chauffeurs, 
and workers of a hundred kinds. In the last de- 
cade or two, an army of skilled men have been 
demanded by the invention of the bicycle, the 
telephone, the electric light and the automobile. 
These entirely new employments strike the mind 
most forcibly, and anyone who runs his eye down 
a city directory showing the occupations of the 
people will satisfy himself that in America of 
the present day at least one-fifth part of the adult 
male population find their livelihood in callings 
that had no existence a generation ago. While 
science takes away with one hand, it liber- 
ally bestows with the other; but what it takes 
away are the low class occupations, and what it 
gives are the high class ones demanding intelli- 
gence and cultivation. The general tendency is, 
therefore, humanizing. The history of the textile 
industry in New England will serve to remind us 
that many of those who perform the more monot- 
onous parts of manufacturing work are, as a rule, 
not skilled workers who have come down to it 
from a higher class of work, but unskilled workers 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 165 

who have risen to it. For exaraple, a great num- 
ber of those who formerly worked in the Lowell 
cotton mills had come there from poverty-stricken 
districts of Ireland. These people have left the 
mills and gone into stores and offices. Later the 
mills had large numbers of French Canadians. 
They left for other occupations. Then came the 
Greeks. They are now leaving for the shoe fac- 
tories or are becoming small retailers of con- 
fectionery in large cities. At the present time 
these mills have Poles who have come from the 
most miserable conditions of life in the poorest 
agTicultural districts where they were fed and 
housed more inadequately than the animals which 
they tended. Of course while there is a gradual 
creeping up in the scale of occupations, it never 
happens that the coal-heaver, when thrown out 
of work by the introduction of a steam crane, can 
go away and get a place in one of the newly 
created superior callings. He is not such a fool 
as to waste his time in applying for an opening 
as an electrical engineer. This transfer is ef- 
fected by the promotion of individuals, but in a 
higher degree it is brought to pass by promotion 
of generations, for it frequently happens that the 
plumber educates his son to be an electrical en- 
gineer, and the teamster apprentices his boy to 
the plumber, and the dock laborer sees his young 
son aspiring to be a chauffeur. 



166 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

What constitutes skill. 

The right of every boy to have an opportunity 
of learning a skilled trade is complicated by the 
difficulty of defining just what the word ^^ skill" 
means; for the modern method of production 
has modified the ordinary conception of what 
constitutes skill. Undoubtedly the numerous 
gradations of skill resulting from the extensive 
use of machinery and subdivisions of labor ren- 
der it extremely difficult to classify laborers into 
noncompetitive groups, each upon a different 
plane from the others. Under modern conditions, 
skill implies not only manual dexterity, but speed 
and accuracy. It is measured not only by the 
quality of the product, but also by the quantity of 
the product. While there is a certain degree of 
intelligence required in the commonest kind of 
labor, nevertheless, in the sense in which the 
terms ^^ skilled" and ^^ unskilled" are used, un- 
skilled labor is generally understood as that 
labor which does not require experience in order 
to give satisfaction to the employer. Skilled 
labor is that which requires sufficient experience 
and training on the part of the worker to do it 
both efficiently and speedily. In this connection. 
Prof. Giddings offers the following classification 
of labor : first, automatic manual labor, including 
common laborers and machine attendants; sec- 
ond, responsible manual labor, including those 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 167 

who can be trusted with some responsibility and 
some degree of self-direction; third, brain work- 
ers, such as bookkeepers ; fourth, responsible brain 
workers, including superintendents and directors. 

A broad division. 

The United States Department of Commerce 
and Labor, in a bulletin published in 1906 on 
*' Condition of Entrance to the Trades,'' roughly 
divided industrial workers into two classes. The 
first class includes those who, from their natural 
ability or training, have become proficient in all 
branches of a trade or craft; who are not only 
able to do the finer kinds of work, but because of 
their training and skill, are also able to perform 
their work intelligently without the constant 
supervision and direction of others. These men 
receive relatively higher wages in all countries, 
and by their skill are enabled to adjust accurately 
their tools to the machinery and manipulate them 
so that the work may be turned out with accu- 
racy and rapidly. The second category com- 
prises the bulk of the unskilled workers ; men who 
have not the ability or who are not sufficiently 
trained to become skilful mechanics. These men 
have not the knowledge or ability to intelligently 
perform all the processes of a trade, but when 
given a simple service to perform, or when placed 
in charge of a machine to which the material is 



168 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

adjusted, they are able to turn out accurate work, 
and one of them, in some cases, may take charge 
of several machines. If a man of this class is 
intelligent and is rapid as well as accurate in 
his movements, he may in time acquire a skill 
which may increase his earnings to or even over 
that of the trained mechanic. 

With specialization of machinery has come the 
specialization of the man. While the effect of 
new processes and machinery in modern industry 
has been to enhance quantitative skill, it has at 
the same time decreased the relative importance 
of qualitative skill. Quantitative skill implies 
close application and the possibility of the worker 
enduring intense nervous strain. Qualitative 
skill, which we more generally recognize in the 
skilled worker, implies both manual dexterity 
and a thorough knowledge of the trade. When 
a boy starts to work in a factory he can be made 
a more profitable unit if his attention is centered 
upon one occupation, and whenever one sees this 
law of production operating he may well think 
of trade schools and the outlook for the boy. 
The boy is put at some task, and the more expert 
he becomes the less likely is he to be shifted to 
anything else. This is a serious matter, and the 
chapter on '^schools in the factory'' points to 
one solution. The other lies in public trade 
schools. 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 169 

Job or vocation. 

Some one has said, ** Germany trains its youth 
for a vocation ; the United States trains its youth 
for a job.'' Gradually it is being recognized 
that the responsibilities of the state in educating 
the people demand not a conventional edu- 
cation, but one that is modified as far as possible 
to meet the needs of individual boys and girls 
and to fit them for that work in life to which 
they seem destined by inclination or qualities. 
We cannot actually plan for each individual child, 
but we can come as near that as the conditions 
will permit. This we have failed to do in the 
past when the educators seem to have been gov- 
erned entirely by the college requirements re- 
gardless of the fact that not every child can be 
a lawyer, a doctor, a clergyman or a business 
man of high rank. If a boy's native talents best 
qualify him to become a blacksmith, let us make 
him the best blacksmith that we can. If a boy 
will make a first rate carpenter and be first rate 
at nothing else, why should we try to force him 
into that something else? He should be shaped 
in the way of his aptitude from the beginning. 
In this way every boy will have the best chance, 
for his maximum development depends upon the 
discovery of his aptitudes. He must be devel- 
oped as an individual, not as a mere particle in 
a mass. It is only by the emphasis upon the in- 



170 THE AVORKER AND THE STATE 

dividual that the state can produce worthy men 
and noble women. When we run the children 
through a pedagogical grist-mill, treating them 
as though there were no individual differences, 
we get a generalized product, like the miller who 
bolts his kernels of corn and turns them into a 
homogeneous mass with their individualism gone 
and their power of germination and growth de- 
stroyed. 

The public trade school. 

Having taken up the economic need for trade 
schools, and the impossibility, in the majority of 
instances, of an adequate training for the young 
wage-earner in the shop itself owing to the mod- 
ern system of production, it is proper at this 
point to consider the distinct methods of these 
schools, their advantages and some of the results 
they may be expected to accomplish. A. trade 
school proper affords the means of an enlightened 
apprenticeship in that it aims to give such an 
ideal preparation for the trades as shall abolish 
the drudgery and waste of the learner's time 
in the shop, by supplying in the school an eco- 
nomic instruction in the practical work and in the 
necessary theory of the trade. The best type of 
trade school has not only shops where the expert 
manipulation of tools is taught but also class- 
rooms where instruction in the theory which un- 



TEADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 171 

derlies the trade is given. The question is often 
asked, ^ ^ Can a school teach a trade T ' In general, 
no trade can be learned entirely within the walls 
of the school. In general, no trade can nowadays 
be learned entirely within the walls of the factory. 
It is a combination of these two opportunities 
which will make our workers more efficient. 

School vs. shop. 

In view of what has been stated in this and 
other chapters regarding the status of appren- 
ticeship and the specialization of manufacturing 
methods, it is worth while at this point to consider 
some of the reasons why a trade school can 
render a better service than the average shop in 
developing skilled mechanics. 

The school helps to make a profitable workman 
in a shorter time by giving him legitimate shop 
practice in the work of the trade under instruc- 
tion. Definite practice in the work of the trade 
from the very beginning in a school is a far dif- 
ferent proposition from sweeping, piling castings 
or running errands for several weeks or months 
in the shop, as is usually the case with the be- 
ginner. 

The school gives a series of graded lessons, 
general and fundamental, upon which other work 
may be based and future efficiency more certainly 
developed. The lack of sequence in the ordinary 



172 THE WORKER AND- THE STATE 

shop work makes his labor mere routine for the 
average boy. 

The school provides the opportunity to do a 
task over and over again until it is done right; 
the opportunity to study each problem closely 
and deliberately. In a shop there is little chance 
to try again. The work must be thrown away. 
A sharp reprimand from the foreman, unac- 
companied by suggestions, can never take the 
place of definite instruction. 

The school presents a broader, more intelli- 
gent idea of the relation of the parts to the whole. 
The beginner learns the dependence of one part 
on another. The tendency to keep a cheap grade 
of laborers doing one thing may make tolerably 
good machine tenders, but if we expect our bright 
boys to respond to unusual problems, they must 
practice all the usual operations of production. 

In the school the instruction is direct and per- 
sonal, given by one who is selected, not only be- 
cause of his superior qualities as a workman, but 
because of his ability to teach. The instruction in 
the average shop is haphazard and accidental, 
given by a foreman who is already harassed by 
a multiplicity of details. It must be said, how- 
ever, that the school will come nearer to taking 
the place of the shop, only as it approaches the 
commercial standard of the shops. The incen- 
tive of the commercial demands of the shop will 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 173 

emphasize the value of time. A clear conception 
of how a piece of work should be done ig neces- 
sary at the outset to avoid a waste of time. 

Distinct field. 

These trade schools ought to be sharply dis- 
tinguished from technical schools and from man- 
ual-training schools. They should have a dis- 
tinct individuality and a definite object of their 
own. They should contain nothing that nat- 
urally looks away from the shops. To quote 
Commissioner Andrew S. Draper, ^'They are 
primarily, neither to quicken mentality nor to 
develop culture : those two things will come in the 
regular order. The ^culturists' are not to ap- 
propriate these new schools. They are not to 
train mechanical or electrical engineers. The 
literary and technical schools are doing that very 
amply. They are not even to develop foremen; 
leaders will develop themselves for they will 
forge ahead of their fellows by reason of their 
own ability, assiduity, and force.'' 

With such a definite object in view it should 
not be difficult to lay down some fundamental 
principles which will operate in establishing these 
schools. In brief they are, as follows: pupils 
enter the trade schools with a definite purpose 
of preparing for industrial careers ; the trade 
school absolutely abandons all college prepara- 



174 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

tory work; there is almost no instruction in pure 
mathematics or pure science, but, instead, a fair 
amount of time is given to such applied mathe- 
matics and applied science as is closely related 
to the trade selected by the pupils — in fact, all 
the instruction, whether in classroom, shop or 
laboratory, is designed so as to be directly usable ; 
the trade schools will necessarily take on varying 
forms in different localities ; they will not be par- 
allel to existing high schools in that they will 
not necessarily draw pupils who have completed 
the eight grades of the elementary school; they 
will have a more or less direct connection with the 
intermediate industrial or vocational schools 
outlined in another chapter; those students in 
the trade schools who have had preliminary in- 
dustrial training in the vocational schools should 
be allowed to take highly specialized courses in 
the trade schools concentrating upon the develop- 
ment of skill and practical knowledge. (See dia- 
gram on page 177.) 

Requirements for admission. 

If a trade school is to reach the largest num- 
bers and do the most effective service, its prob- 
lem is not primarily that of the high school, for 
it ought to be clear that boys who enter mechan- 
ical trades, leave the public schools almost with- 
out exception before graduating from the gram- 



TKADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 175 

mar grades. Consequently, the beginnings of 
trade education, if such education is to articu- 
late with our present school system, must be had 
in schools that will draw their pupils largely if 
not entirely, from the class of boys who have not 
graduated from our present elementary schools. 
Such education, therefore, cannot be parallel with 
existing' high schools. In order to prevent pos- 
sible misunderstanding by pupils or the public, 
such schools should be frankly recognized as in- 
dependent in their requirements for admission. 
The closer they follow this procedure the nearer 
they will come within the economic possibilities 
of boys and girls who follow manufacturing 
trades. That a trade school cannot have the ac- 
ademic requirements of our present high school 
is evident from the statement of an Albany, New 
York, manufacturer: ^^I have made inquiry of 
over 100 workmen in my employ, machinists 
largely, hence representing a trade of intelligence 
higher than the average. The inquiry developed 
two facts. First, out of 102 men there was not 
to be found a single graduate of a high school 
nor a person who ever attended as a pupil in a 
high school course. Second, out of 102 men I 
found only 7 who had completed the course in the 
grammar schools. From this it appears that the 
education of all of these mechanics was limited 
to such instruction as is furnished by the gram- 



Relation of Intermediate Industrial to Other Schools. 

The relation of the intermediate industrial to other 
schools is important. It is clear that there need be no 
''blind alleys" in a comprehensive scheme of industrial 
education. Neither industrial nor trade schools make 
for class distinction or class education. They simply 
provide an educational opportunity as purposeful and 
definite for those who work in our constructive indus- 
tries, as is now provided for entrance to the professions. 
The former school is expected to fit for the trade school 
or for the industrial courses in high schools. A gradu- 
ate of this school may enter the advanced courses in the 
technical high school. 

The courses of study in the industrial schools will be 
from two to four years in length, because this length of 
time is necessary to produce the requisite training for a 
life of progression in industrial efficiency. The trade 
schools will be open to pupils who are sixteen years of 
age, and will fit directly for the productive and dis- 
tributive industries. While the trade schools will not 
fit for the technical college, there is no reason to believe 
that a bright boy could not enter a technical college 
from a trade school if the college would but recognize 
the training which the school gives. 

While allowing a reasonable interchange of students 
from one school to another as they find their interests in 
their probable future employments changing, care should 
be exercised that industrial education has a distinct field 
of its own. 



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178 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

mar schools and that 93 per cent of them belong to 
the class of pupils that drop out of school before 
completing the grammar school course." 

This point is well illustrated by the story of a 
boy in a western city who thought that if he re- 
mained in school he would be educated away 
from working with his hands. He had been kept 
in school and prevented from playing truant by 
the efforts of a city judge. Having reached the 
age of fourteen he left school and after a lapse 
of some months was accosted in the street by the 
judge, who said: "John, why have you left 
school?" He answered that he was working for 
a plumber. The judge then said: "Why did you 
not remain in school and finish the course and get 
an education!" The boy unconsciously discov- 
ered and stated the deficiency of the school sys- 
tem in which he had been a student, when he 
answered: "Why, Judge, if I keep on going to 
school and get an education, how can I get to 
be a plumber's helper?" 

Manual training vs. trade training. 

Naturally the question arises as to the relation- 
ship between manual training and trade training. 
The existing manual training courses in the high 
schools are not trade courses, neither the manual 
nor the academic instruction being especially 
planned to be of direct vocational service. Their 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 179 

pupils are of the same general type, of the same 
age and of the same preparatory training as are 
the pupils of the classical courses. Their courses 
endeavor to develop the same type of intelligence, 
the same hahits of thought and the same kinds 
of ability as do the other courses in the high 
schools. They are located in schools of the col- 
lege preparatory type in which the instruction, 
mechanical as well as academic, aims to provide 
the mental discipline of the kind required of those 
who would continue their studies in higher insti- 
tutions. In filling this function, these schools 
are serving a useful purpose in that they offer 
a large variety of means by which pupils who are 
capable of a higher study can get intellectual 
training and preparation for higher institutions, 
through subjects which are congenial and adapted 
to their tastes. 

Eecently a new type of secondary school, called 
the technical high school, has originated, having 
for its distinct purpose the preparation of its 
pupils for industrial leadership — that is, for 
positions in industrial life requiring skill and 
technical knowledge and of greater importance 
and responsibility than those of the skilled me- 
chanics. In such a school the instruction deals 
not only with the important manual operations, 
but also with those principles of science and 
mathematics and their direct application to in- 



180 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

dustrial work which will help the student to 
master the more intricate processes and prob- 
lems of the industries which are taught in the 
school. This type of school approaches more 
closely the trade school than the manual training 
high school, but is not to be confused with it. At 
the risk of repetition, it must be said that the 
trade schools have for their definite purpose the 
preparing of boys or girls for skilled mechan- 
ical trades and that they deal with their pupils 
during a briefer course and allow practical work 
earlier than the technical high school. The trade 
school places its greatest emphasis upon practi- 
cal handwork instruction and makes the condi- 
tions concerning this part of its work resemble 
those in the actual trade as closely as possible; 
and it also relates its academic instruction at 
every point closely to the practical work, includ- 
ing little which will not be afterwards directly 
usable in trade work. No note of disparagement 
of the work of the advanced technical schools or 
the manual training high schools is intended. 
The higher technical schools are of the highest 
advantage and they might well be multiplied. 
The same may be said of the manual training 
schools of high school grade, but it should be 
known that they are essentially college prepara- 
tory schools, or schools of general culture and 
that they do little in the way of training work- 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 181 

men. The state now stands in need of training 
in craftsmanship. This is a land of educational 
opportunity and of free choice of work. The 
public has had the habit of providing schools 
which lead to professional, more than to indus- 
trial employments. This is a discrimination 
which is unjust to many of our people and it is 
clearly a disadvantage to the community. 

An academic objection. 

The question is often raised whether, if a sys- 
tem of trade schools is to train for individual 
occupations, there is any normal limit to the num- 
ber of such schools that will be needed in any 
given locality, seeing that there are over 300 rec- 
ognized occupations in this country. The ques- 
tion is largely academic; for an analysis of va- 
rious industries will show that the processes of 
production may be classed roughly under two 
heads: first, the constructive trades in which the 
work is essentially individual and quite independ- 
ent of machines, especially those that are auto- 
matic, as, for example, plumbing, patternmaking, 
printing, cabinetmaking, tool making, lithog- 
raphy, die making, etc.; and second, manufac- 
turing industries in which there are many em- 
ployees who work with much machinery, where 
workmen act in cooperation, where each is a part 
of an organization, as, for example, in such 



182 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

highly specialized industries as shoes^ textiles, 
knitting and clothing. In the first division the 
schools may train mechanics who work independ- 
ently, mainly with their own tools and without ma- 
chinery. In the other, the schools must train, as 
far as it is possible, all-around workmen. 

In cities not large enough to maintain a num- 
ber of special monotechnic school units it may 
be possible to have two types of trade schools by 
considering the constructive trades as roughly di- 
vided into two main classes: first, the building 
trades — i. e., carpentry, masonry, plumbing and 
pipe fitting, and such fundamental trades as are 
concerned in the erection of buildings; and sec- 
ond, the mechanical trades — i. e., pattern making, 
forging, cabinet making, the several forms of ma- 
chine shop production, and all such other lines of 
shop work as involve the use of machine and 
hand tools. 

The Williamson School of Trades. 

A brief description of at least one trade school 
ought to be given. For the purpose the William- 
son School of Trades has been chosen. To be 
sure, it is a private school, generously endowed 
and operated under unusual conditions — in fact 
it is almost a '* trade-college," but its record of 
twenty years makes it well worth describing. At 
its seventeenth annual commencement in 1910 it 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 183 

graduated 51 boys out of 70 who entered the class 
three years ago. These boys 'were divided among 
five trades : 14 carpenters, 12 bricklayers, 11 ma- 
chinists, 10 patternmakers and 4 stationary en- 
gineers. In 1910 Director Bitting writes: '^We 
graduated 51 and before noon of commencement 
day could have placed 160 without any effort on 
our part at all; since then we might have placed 
at least 50 more, making a total call of about 200 
to 225 for 51 men. Since their graduation I have 
heard directly by letter from 33 of the 51, and all 
report a very successful start in the industrial 
world; the rate of compensation varying from 
ten to thirty dollars per week. The majority of 
our students start with wages ranging from 
twelve to sixteen dollars per week. The calls 
for them come from many sections of the country 
and the boys are pretty well scattered." The 
school has turned out 777 boys trained in these 
five trades. The record of the last five classes 
is as follows; Bricklayers, 62; carpenters, 59; 
stationary engineers, 31 ; machinists, 62 ; pattern- 
makers, 54 — total 268. They are engaged in 
the following pursuits: at mechanical trades as 
journeymen, foremen, superintendents and con- 
tractors, 244; at college, 5; at commercial pur- 
suits, 15; no information, 2 — total 266. Four of 
those at college worked for considerable time after 
graduating, at their trades, and the two who died 



184 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

were doing the same. The average wages per 
day received by these graduates are as follows: 
bricklayers, $4.64; carpenters, $3.84; stationary 
engineers, $3.60; machinists, $3.28; pattern-mak- 
ers, $3.10 — the first two being for eight hour day 
and the last three for 10 hour day.'' 

To be sure, Williamson has its own advan- 
tages, not shared or likely to be shared, by most 
other schools of similar intent. It has what to 
most schools would have been a misfortune, an 
endowment of $2,500,000. It has a board of 
trustees composed of business men forming a 
close corporation. It has a site in the country 
consisting of 230 acres of land. It has its boys 
on the school premises all the time. It selects 
each year an entering class of about 75 boys 
from a waiting list of 400. Naturally, these boys 
are a picked lot, for pupils have everything to 
do with the success of this or any other school. 
They are healthy looking boys, full of life and 
fun, but appreciate that their working time is 
for work. They have to choose their trade be- 
fore they enter and consequently the school loses 
but a small part of its number during the course ; 
70 to 75 per cent of the boys who enter stay and 
are graduated. Of course part of this is due to 
the unusual conditions of free board, room and 
clothing, which can hardly prevail in public school 
work. The shops and academic portion of the 



TRADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 185 

school are in session eight hours daily on five 
days of the week, and three hours on Saturday, 
each apprentice spending about one-half of the 
time in the shops during the first year, the pro- 
portion gradually increasing until the last three 
months of the last year, when it includes the en- 
tire day. The branches taught in the academic 
department are reading, writing, grammar, arith- 
metic, algebra, geometry, trigonometry, physical 
and political geography, U. S. history, English 
literature, physical science, physiology and hygi- 
ene, civil government, chemistry, elementary 
vocal music, theory of the steam engine, strength 
of materials, building construction, and mechan- 
ical and freehand drawing. The instruction in 
drawing pertains directly to the apprentice's 
particular trade. The mechanical courses are 
systematic and the exercises are very comprehen- 
sive and thorough, and are based on instructional 
methods. The school is not a factory and noth- 
ing is made for sale, its sole object being the im- 
provement of its apprentices. The managers be- 
lieve this plan to be better than if they worked 
on commercial lines, for in that case they would 
be obliged to subordinate their instruction in a 
considerable degree to the financial gain. Nev- 
ertheless, it must not be assumed that the shop 
work is not practical. For example, the boys, 
as a part of their building trade course, have 



186 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

built a shop 60 by 120 feet, four stories high; a 
double cottage accommodating 30 or 40 people; 
a barn, a pump house, and so on. In fact, for 
many years they have done all the necessary 
building work themselves. Naturally the expense 
has been simply the cost of material plus the cost 
of such work on the building as comes under 
trades other than those taught in the school. Of 
course the boys in the first year do not work on 
permanent structures. They work in the base- 
ment of the shop on plain 4-, 8-, and 12-inch walls 
with returns and partition, walls, plain arches 
and simple corbels. The work is torn down and 
rebuilt as often as necessary so that the boy may 
have abundant practice. During the second and 
third years the boys proceed to actual construc- 
tion where poor work is torn out and done over 
again at once and where the boys realize that it 
is to stand for years a monument to their ability. 

The objector answered. 

Someone has said, ^^The most remarkable 
thing about trade schools in America is their ab- 
sence." Every sort of objection has been raised 
against them. The combination of social, edu- 
cational and economic difficulties has been too 
great for the few private trade schools that have 
started. Schools in common with other ventures 



TEADE SCHOOLS AT SIXTEEN 187 

are likely to move along the line of least resist- 
ance. For this reason, several schools that were 
planned by their donors to be trade schools have 
proved nnfaithful to the trust imposed upon 
them. But gradually the trade school movement 
is making headway. 

Eobert A. Woods, head worker of the South 
End house in Boston, outlines the advantages 
of trade schools from his observation as a so- 
cial worker : ' ' When our working people under- 
stand that this further development of educa- 
tion comes in precisely where they themselves 
feel the need of training; when they see that 
the taking of the younger children out of the 
labor market will raise the wage for all the older 
members of the family ; when they understand 
that the higher degree of technical skill got under 
the most favorable conditions will mean for the 
boy or girl the capacity to earn within a short 
time a surplus sufficient to cover the additional 
school period; that he will be established for life 
upon an ascending wage standard ; that he will be 
assured permanently of much more steady em- 
ployment and will have a distinctly longer work- 
ing life — then we shall see the very large ma- 
jority, even of the poorer families, contriving to 
do their utmost to give their children so precious 
an opportunity." In the final analysis we can 



188 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

safely trust to the wisdom of the people. We 
can do no better service than to educate the pub- 
lic conscience to the point where it will see 
through practical examples the value of trade 
schools. 



VI 

TRADE UNIONS AND TRADE SCHOOLS 

OEGANIZED labor has always concerned 
itself with the welfare of • the industrial 
workers of the country. It has agitated the 
questions of a higher living wage, better factory 
conditions, and proper restrictions of child labor. 
In the latter connection it has always supported 
any legislation which would increase the number 
of years that boys and girls should stay in school. 
Now more effective education and the raising of 
the age limit of school attendance are intimately 
associated; so it is not surprising to find trade 
unions observing keenly a movement which as- 
sists in keeping children at school by a direct 
appeal to the child's needs and interests, the es- 
tablishment of sound and thorough industrial 
education. 

Education and labor. 

Labor leaders are aware that it is not wise for 
boys to leave school before reaching the age of 
business efficiency, and believe that rational in- 
dustrial training between the ages of fourteen 

189 



190 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

and sixteen ought to awaken in them a new 
school interest as well as prepare them to enter 
some branch of the industrial world; for organ- 
ized labor maintains that as much attention 
should be paid to the education of those who are 
to work in our industries as is now given to those 
who are to enter the time-honored professions. 

At present, the methods of our schools are too 
closely related to educational tradition; and the 
mass of our school children has been, and is, 
actually trained away from a proper attitude 
toward manual work and from a sympathy with 
those who must work with their hands. A 1910 
report of the American Federation of Labor 
relating to this subject states, ^' Owing to past 
methods and influences, false views and notions 
possess the minds of too many of our youths, 
which cause them to shun work at the trades and 
to seek the office or store as much more genteel 
and fitting. This silly notion has been shaken 
by the healthy influence of unions and will be en- 
tirely eradicated if industrial training becomes 
a part of our school system. In consequence of 
this system the youth will advance greatly in 
general intelligence as well as in technical skill 
and in mental and moral worth. He will be a 
better citizen and a better man, and will be more 
valuable to society and to the country.'' » 



TRADE UNIONS AND TRADE SCHOOLS 191 

Banger of specialization. 

Now the trend of industrial development is 
constantly along the line of specialization. 
Modern manufacture dispenses with the all- 
around worker. Theoretically, at least, the 
workers who do but one task over and over again 
in place of the hundred different operations 
originally performed by every worker, ought to 
reach a high level of efficiency by the mere repe- 
tition of the process. Yet this is by no means cer- 
tain. '^It must be recognized,'' states Samuel 
Gompers, President of the American Federation 
of Labor, ^^that specialists in industry are vastly 
different from specialists in the professions. In 
the professions specialists develop from the 
knowledge of all the elements of the science of the 
profession. Specialists in industry are those 
who know but one part of a trade and absolutely 
nothing of any other part of it. In the profes- 
sions specialists are possessed of all the learn- 
ing of their art; in industry the specialists are 
denied the opportunity of learning the commonest 
elementary rudiments of industry other than the 
same infinitesimal part performed by them per- 
haps thousands of times over each day.'' Indus- 
trial training, therefore, to be successful, must not 
make the mistake of attempting to turn out spe- 
cialists in any one branch. Its work will be to 



192 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

develop a general working intelligence rather 
than the special skill needed for the single feature 
of a complicated process, the performance of 
which will have to be learned in the factory itself. 

Public or private control. 

Undoubtedly if the trade school movement in 
America is to make appreciable headway it must 
have the sympathy and aid of the labor organi- 
zations. This is perhaps the strongest reason 
for urging that these schools become a part of 
the public school system. If the community does 
not interest itself in public industrial training, 
but leaves it to be carried on by private enter- 
prise, there is danger of selfish exploitation of 
the workman by the manufacturing concerns, with 
the result of a narrow, specialized training of the 
student for the benefit of the individual employer. 
It is no wonder that private trades schools have 
excited prejudice and even hostility, for unions 
will never widely accept schools which they think 
are created and operated in the interest of the 
employer and not of the employee. They will 
not sanction what can be used in favor of an- 
other, and often opposed interest, thus arrayed 
against their own. 

A way must therefore be found involving pub- 
lic ownership of these schools, that they may be 
managed for the benefit of all the people, or at 



TRADE UNIONS AND TRADE SCHOOLS 193 

least of all who may have common interests in 
any trade. In nearly every town where there 
has been general agitation of the subject of in- 
dustrial education, organized labor has expressed 
the sentiment that such schools should be ad- 
ministered by existing educational bodies — ad- 
vising, however, that these should have the as- 
sistance and cooperation of persons engaged in 
the trades and industries and every school to 
have its local advisory board appointed by the 
proper school authorities. With the counsel and 
advice of such a board, labor believes that in the 
schools a just balance can be maintained between 
the interests of employer and employee, capital 
and labor uniting in a plan for developing effi- 
ciency of the workman, educating him socially 
and industrially. 

Place of the graduate. 

Trade schools are professional schools for 
those who are to become workmen. Labor lead- 
ers often speak of their apprehension in regard 
to the schools' turning out finished craftsmen, 
sometimes going so far as to call them ''scab 
hatcheries. '^ But the trade schools cannot ex- 
pect to graduate ''finished" craftsmen any more 
than the law and medical or business schools can 
expect to send out finished lawyers, physicians, 
or managers and superintendents. The time is 



194 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

not far distant, however, when the finished crafts- 
man will be as dependent on the technical and 
trade schools for his education in his calling as 
the lawyers and doctors are on the professional 
schools to-day. Compare the purpose of the 
state normal school with that of the trade school : 
For years the state normal school has been giv- 
ing vocational training to those who plan to be- 
come teachers. It is the combination of normal 
training and actual teaching that makes efiScient 
teachers. Yet no one will affirm that a recent 
graduate is the equal of a teacher of experience. 
Nor will the graduate of a trade school be able 
to take the place of a finished journeyman. 
While it is practically impossible to acquire an 
all-around training in the shop or factory, it is 
equally true that no trade can be learned entirely 
within the walls of a school. The trade school, 
however, which has a shop where expert manip- 
ulation of tools is taught, and a class room in 
which is given the theoretical instruction under- 
lying a trade, will form a good foundation on 
which to build individual advancement when the 
worker enters the shop. This preparation for 
individual efficiency can scarcely be said to men- 
ace any legitimate or existent interest of organ- 
ized labor. 



TRADE UNIONS AND TRADE SCHOOLS 195 

Time of entrance into trades. 

It is undoubtedly true that the trade school will 
shorten the period of apprenticeship in the fac- 
tory. Industrial training, however, does not pre- 
suppose an earlier entrance to industry than at 
present, nor that such training will displace any 
of the necessary and fundamental studies now 
taught in our schools. Under no circumstances 
will organized labor endorse a substitution of in- 
dustrial training for the ordinary school arts, 
such as reading, writing, spelling, drawing, arith- 
metic; nor emphasizing it before the rudiments 
of history, geography and nature study are fairly 
completed. The report of the American Federa- 
tion previously referred to anent this subject 
states, ^^Our movement in advocating industrial 
education protests most emphatically against the 
elimination from our public school system of any 
line of learning now taught. Education technic- 
ally or industrially must be supplementary to 
and in connection with our modern school sys- 
tem. That for which our movement stands will 
tend to make better workers of our future citizens, 
better citizens of our future workers.'' That is, 
it is imperative that every child shall have the 
elements of a common school education; how- 
ever long it may be necessary to prolong the 
school period to attain it, he must be able to read 



19G THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

understandingly, to write legibly, and use figures 
intelligently if only for his own protection, to 
prevent others from over-reaching him. If he. 
is to hold his own in our modern civilization he 
must also receive instruction in certain princi- 
ples of ethics and economics which have a direct 
bearing on social and industrial life. No study 
which contributes to his future usefulness as a 
citizen or develops the better side of his nature, 
can be neglected or replaced by vocational train- 
ing. 

Those educators who feel a deep concern re- 
garding the danger of vocational training lower- 
ing the standard of present education need have 
little fear of such an outcome, for they are not the 
only sponsors of sound education. Whenever I 
have appeared before a body of trade unionists 
I have been impressed with the earnestness with 
which these men discussed the problems of edu- 
cation. Oftentimes I have found that they can 
be trusted even more than bodies of educators to 
guard the educational interests of our boys and 
girls. In these meetings there is never a note 
sounded which might be interpreted as being an 
argument for class distinctions in educational 
policy. It is the ambition of every working man 
that his child have a better chance than he had. 
The only pathetic incident is that sometimes 



TRADE UNIONS AND TRADE SCHOOLS 197 

these men feel that the chance is apart from any 
work with the hands. 

A heavy responsibility rests on industrial teach- 
ing. To command respect, it must be in the 
hands of real artisans and not of theorists who 
are indifferent mechanics. Whatever is done will 
have to be done thoroughly. Labor will tolerate' 
no false pretense in regard to mechanical skill. 
These schools must minimize talking and mag- 
nify doing. At the same time, to be of greatest 
service to both individual and community, they 
must not only prepare the student for actual 
work, but continue the cultivation of mind and 
spirit begun in the earlier years of school. 

At a legislative hearing in Boston, an academic 
discussion had been in progress for several hours, 
relating to supposed difficulties in starting trade 
schools. The questions as to whether these 
schools would lower wages and how many years 
of apprenticeship would be deducted by attend- 
ance upon them were discussed. In common with 
others present, I was startled by a sudden outburst 
from a labor leader when he said, ^'Grive us the 
schools, let the boys have this trade education, 
and we labor men will look after the spoils." 
Certainly there was food for thought in his re- 
mark, for no amount of discussion by professional 
educators can determine these points. After all, 



198 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

the main question is to have the right sort of in- 
dustrial education, leaving the *^ spoils" of in- 
creased wages and shortened apprenticeship to be 
adjusted by capital and labor. 

Supplemental training. 

We have been discussing the trade school for 
the young student. There is another class that 
demands attention — those already engaged in 
the trades, who are desirous of promotion and 
feel the impossibility of advance without the 
definite training such as a school can give. It is 
to be taken for granted that organized labor will 
lend its support to any plan of public industrial 
education which will emphasize the training of 
those already engaged in the trades. It has, in- 
deed, urged that industrial schools should be 
open evenings for those who cannot attend dur- 
ing the day. Evening instruction is necessarily 
supplemental in its character and should be lim- 
ited to those who can gain a direct benefit from 
it. For example, it is obviously unfair to hold 
out alluring inducements to a store clerk that he 
may become a plumber if he attends a night 
school. Practical trade experience in the day- 
time supplemented by evening schools in which 
is taught a considerable amount of theory, of 
scientific principles underlying the trade, with 
some practical shop work, is the only sane pro- 



TRADE UNIONS AND TRADE SCHOOLS 199 

cedure. In general, these industrial and trade 
schools should be flexible enough to provide, first, 
for those who can attend school all day; second, 
for those who must work a part of the time in 
order to earn a living, but can afford to go to 
school for a short session; and third, for those 
who must work all day, but wish to attend school 
at night. 

Lahor^s first step. 

At several conventions of the Ajnerican Fed- 
eration of Labor there have been discussions of 
the varied topics of industrial education. At the 
Denver meeting in 1908 the following resolu- 
tions were adopted : 

*^ Whereas, industrial education is necessary 
and inevitable for the progress of an industrial 
people; and 

^'Whereas, there are two groups with opposite 
methods and seeking antagonistic ends, now ad- 
vocating industrial education in the United 
States; and 

** Whereas, one of these groups is largely com- 
posed of the non-union employers of the country 
who advance industrial education as a special 
privilege under conditions that educate the stu- 
dent or apprentice to non-union sympathies and 
prepare him as a skilled worker for scab labor 
and strike-breaking purposes, thus using the chil- 



200 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

dren of the workers against the interests of their 
organized fathers and brothers in the various 
crafts; and 

*^ Whereas this group also favors the training 
of the student or apprentice for skill in only one 
industrial process, thus making the graduate a 
skilled worker in only a very limited sense and 
rendering him entirely helpless if lack of employ- 
ment comes in his single subdivision of a craft ; and 

^^ Whereas the other group is composed of 
great educators, enlightened representatives of 
organized labor and persons engaged in genuine 
social service, who advocate industrial education 
as a common right, to be open to all children on 
equal terms, to be provided by general taxation 
and kept under the control of the whole people 
with a method or system of education that will 
make the apprentice or graduate a skilled crafts- 
man in all the branches of his trade ; and 

^^ Whereas organized labor has the largest per- 
sonal and the highest public interest in the sub- 
ject of industrial education and should enlist its 
ablest and best men in behalf of the best system 
under conditions that will promote the interests 
of the workers and the general welfare, now 
therefore, be it 

^'EESOLVED, that the President, in conjunc- 
tion with the Executive Council of the American 
Federation of Labor, be and is hereby author- 



TRADE UNIONS AND TRADE SCHOOLS 201 

ized to appoint a special committee of at least 15, 
to be composed of a majority of trade imion mem- 
bers of this convention, who will serve without 
compensation and incur no expenses other than 
necessary and legitimate expenditure within the 
judgment of the president and executive council 
to investigate the methods and means of indus- 
trial education in this country and abroad and to 
report its findings, conclusions and recommenda- 
tions to the next annual meeting of the American 
Federation of Labor.'' 

A definite program. 

In order to bring out practical suggestions to- 
ward a solution of the problem the special com- 
mittee of fifteen addressed themselves to the fol- 
lowing questions : 

1. Should trade, vocational, technical and in- 
dustrial schools be established as a part of the 
public school system! 

2. Should private industrial educational insti- 
tutions be tolerated? 

3. Under what conditions and terms should in- 
dustrial schools, either public or private, be 
countenanced and supported? 

4. Under what conditions should semi-private 
or semi-public industrial schools — ^namely, the so- 
called ^^cooperative industrial schools," be ap- 
proved or disapproved? 



202 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

5. Should they be free, supported by the city, 
county or state in which they are located^ 

6. Should they be under the control or partial 
control of the national government? 

7. And should their instructors or teachers be 
practical men from the ranks of trade occupations 
or should they be men who know nothing of the 
trade itself except its theoretical side? 

8. What should be taught under the head of ^ ^ in- 
dustrial education'' — the cultural side, the profes- 
sional side, the mechanical side, or all combined? 

9. To what extent, if any, should labor head- 
quarters, labor temples and labor halls be used to 
favor industrial education! 

Report of 1909 Committee. 

Invitations were extended to leading educa- 
tors, business men and publicists to appear be^ 
fore this committee and as a result a report was 
made to the Toronto Convention of 1909. An 
abstract of the conclusions of the committee fol- 
lows : 

^^If the American workman is to maintain the 
high standard of efficiency the boys and girls of 
the country must have an opportunity to acquire 
educated hands and brains such as may enable 
them to earn a living in a self-selected vocation 
and acquire an intelligent understanding of the 
duties of good citizenship. 



TRADE UNIONS AND TRADE SCHOOLS 203 

*^ There is a strong reaction coming in general 
methods of education, and that growing feeling 
which is gaining rapidly in strength, that the hu- 
man element must be recognized and cannot be so 
disregarded as to make the future workers mere 
automatic machines. 

*^The committee recommends that any tech- 
nical education of the workers in trade and 
industry being a public necessity, it should not 
be a private but a public function, conducted by 
the public and the expense involved at public 
cost. 

^*We favor the establishment of schools in con- 
nection with the public school system at which 
pupils between the ages of fourteen and sixteen 
may be taught the principles of the trades, not 
necessarily in separate buildings but in separate 
schools adapted to this particular education and 
by competent and trained teachers. 

^^The course of instruction in such a school 
should be English, mathematics, physics, chem- 
istry, elementary mechanics and drawing; the 
shop instruction for particular trades and for 
each trade represented, the drawing, mathematics, 
mechanics, physical and biological science ap- 
plicable to the trade, the history of that trade and 
a sound system of economics, including and em- 
phasizing the philosophy of collective bargain- 
ing. This will serve to prepare the pupil for 



204 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

more advanced subjects and, in addition, to dis- 
close his capacity for a specific vocation. 

^'In order to keep such schools in close touch 
with the trades, there should be local advisory 
boards including representatives of the industries, 
employers and organized labor. 

^'Experience has shown that manual training 
school teachers without actual trade experience 
do not and cannot successfully solve this great 
problem, and that progress will necessarily be 
slow, as new teachers must be provided, a new set 
of text books will have to be written and the sub- 
jects taught in a sympathetic and systematic 
manner. 

''We advocate the continuance of progressive 
development of supplemental trade education, as 
inaugurated by trade unions, and call special at- 
tention to the work undertaken by the Interna- 
tional Typographical Union in the establishment 
of a school for the higher education of its mem- 
bers.'' 

Position taken abroad. 

While industrial conditions in America differ 
from those in other countries, it is interesting to 
observe the attitude of foreign labor-unions to- 
ward vocational schools. A striking fact is the 
staunch endorsement given them by trades unions 
as well as manufacturers. The beginnings of 



TRADE UNIONS AND TRADE SCHOOLS 205 

such schools were occasionally marked by mis- 
understanding and suspicion on the part of or- 
ganized labor, but this hostility has entirely 
disappeared with the enlightened attitude of their 
unions, who find skill the basis of promotion. In 
many instances prizes for proficiency are offered 
by the unions and are much coveted by ambitious 
students. In some cities the work is backed 
financially not only by grants from national and 
municipal sources but by donations of both man- 
ufacturers and organized labor. 

The trade union of Great Britain has urged 
parliamentary action which would further sec- 
ondary and technical education, as an essential 
part of every child's education, and secured by 
such an extension of the scholarship system as 
will place a maintenance scholarship within the 
reach of every child and thus make it possible for 
all children to be full time day pupils up to the 
age of sixteen. 

At a recent Irish trades union Congress it was 
agreed that the time at the disposal of appren- 
tices for acquiring a thorough technical knowledge 
of their respective trades was at present entirely 
inadequate, and urged upon employers the desira- 
bility of granting further opportunities by allow- 
ing their apprentices a few hours' leave upon such 
days as they undertake to attend the technical 
schools so as to enable them to become more 



206 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

proficient workmen. A resolution was passed 
urging that the Department of Technical Instruc- 
tion for Ireland press this matter upon local 
technical committees and employers' associations 
throughout the country. 

In France, the trades unions were at first hostile 
to trade schools. The opposition was based upon 
a misunderstanding of their intended scope. At 
the present time the graduates of these schools 
are looked upon as a great asset to the unions 
since they enable its ranks to be made up of the 
very best artisans obtainable. This standard is 
kept high by the appointment from the unions of 
visiting or advisory boards to keep in touch with 
the various schools and their work. 

At a convention of trades unionists in Belgium 
in 1907 it was the consensus of opinion that in- 
dustrial schools would produce workmen of more 
intelligence than those trained in the ordinary 
way. Efforts are made to learn when students 
are ready to qualify as graduates in order that 
the union may assist in placing them as appren- 
tices and securing their membership in the or- 
ganization. 

In 1906 Switzerland passed a law compelling 
every employer of labor who seeks to teach a trade 
or accept boys or girls as apprentices, to allow 
these children to attend during the day, at least 
four hours weekly, such schools as will advance 



TRADE UNIONS AND TRADE SCHOOLS 207 

or assist them in their chosen profession. This 
law was passed by a referendum vote of the peo- 
ple of the entire nation. It was favored by the 
wage workers and opposed by the employers. 
Eecognizing the lack of a general system of in- 
dustrial education and knowing that they must 
have schools of their own if they were to com- 
pete with the technically educated French and 
German workmen, the Swiss trade unionists 
have established such schools and support them 
out of their own funds. At present the printers, 
painters, shoemakers and tailors are receiving a 
cantonal subvention to assist in carrying on their 
schools. 

An important investigation. 

In 1908 the Bureau of Statistics of the New 
York State Department of Labor, under the 
direction of Prof. Charles E. Eichards of Cooper 
Union, made an investigation to determine the 
general relation of supply and demand in regard 
to skilled labor in the principal industries in the 
state, the conditions under which boys and girls 
enter the industries and their chances for ad- 
vancement, together with the opinions of both 
employers and employees as to the value and need 
of industrial training outside of commercial estab- 
lishments. The industries selected for investi- 
gation were those representing the prominent 



^08 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

skilled trades and the important mill and factory 
industries employing low or medium skilled labor. 
In addition, a few industries employing largely 
unskilled labor, such as laundries, the manufac- 
ture of confectionery, and paper box making, were 
added on account of the great number of minors 
engaged in such trades. 

The replies of secretaries of the labor unions 
of the State to the question, ^^Do you favor a 
public industrial or preparatory trade school 
which would endeavor to reach boys and girls be- 
tween fourteen and sixteen that now leave the 
common school in very large numbers before 
graduation? Such a school would not teach a 
trade but would give a wide acquaintance with 
materials and fundamental processes, together 
with drawing and shop mathematics, with the ob- 
ject of giving a better preparation for entering 
the industries at sixteen and better opportunities 
for subsequent advancement. The results are as 
follows: 1,500 answered ''yes,'' 349 ''no," 23 
qualified "yes," 5 qualified "no," 574 not answer- 
ing—total 2,451. Care, however, was taken in 
framing the question to bring out the fact that the 
school is not to teach a special trade but is aimed 
to prepare those below sixteen years of age to en- 
ter the industries at greater advantage, and this 
point seems to have been generally appreciated 
by those sending replies. 



TRADE UNIONS AKD TRADE SCHOOLS 209 

The returns from labor union offices in answer 
to the question, '^Do you favor public trade 
schools for boys and girls between sixteen and 
eighteen, that would give two years of practical 
training together with drawing and mathematics, 
provided the graduates of such schools should 
serve two years more as apprentices or im- 
provers?'^ will undoubtedly prove of much inter- 
est. 1,232 answered ^^yes," 567 '^no,'' 71 qual- 
ified ''yes,'' 7 qualified ''no," 574 not answering — 
total 2,451. 

These replies indicate apparently that organ- 
ized labor has reached a point, at least in New 
York State, where it is taking a position of dis- 
crimination in regard to the question of trade 
schools. The feeling of opposition to trade 
schools on general grounds is being replaced by 
an attitude which favors a trade school adminis- 
tered by public officials that will stand for thor- 
oughness of training and for a shortened period 
of practical apprenticeship in the trade before 
the journeyman's status is obtained. As for the 
opposition of organized labor to the school which 
gives a brief and superficial training and sends 
out the graduate to compete with the journeymen, 
it is shared by most fair-minded employers and 
other students of the subject. On the other hand, 
all experience, as well as intelligent forecast, 
makes it clear that organized labor need have no 



210 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

fear of large increase in the supply of skilled 
labor through trade schools that limit the age of 
the student and which provide thorough and com- 
prehensive courses of instruction under public 
auspices. 

Labor and capital. 

Capital is always able to take care of itself un- 
der economic laws that are well understood. It 
has a strong enough motive for activity in the 
hope of profits. On the other hand, labor has a 
stronger one in the need of bread. In the words 
of Andrew S. Draper, New York State Commis- 
sioner of Education, ^^In this country it is not in 
the nature of either to brook injustice, and the 
needs of each make it unnecessary that the other 
do so. In the last analysis each will have to 
square with the plan that stands fair, that en- 
courages capital to provide labor for workmen by 
protecting all of the just rights of capital and that 
encourages the man to make the most of himself 
by assuring all of his just rights in individual in- 
dustry and skill.'' 



vn 

CO-OPERATIYE SYSTEM OF INDUSTRIAL 
TRAINING 

THE rapid development of the mannfacturing 
interests of our country during the past de- 
cade, particularly in the metal-working lines, has 
increased the problem of finding an adequate sup- 
ply of labor of a proper degree of efficiency. 
Manufacturers have for some time realized that 
the efficiency of the labor that offers itself for 
employment is not always of high standard. To 
a large extent this is due to the fact that manu- 
facturing processes have become so highly organ- 
ized that mechanics are not being made in the 
system of production. Add to this the fact that 
the great majority of applicants have not com- 
pleted even the elementary school course and are 
not prepared to meet the problems that confront 
them upon entering the manufacturing establish- 
ments. 

Factory waste. 

While there is a greater subdivision of labor 
than ever, it is to-day acknowledged by builders 

211 



212 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

of machine tools that they need a working force 
of greater general intelligence than in the days 
when simpler machines and simpler processes 
were employed. A careful analysis of manufac- 
turing conditions by experts has revealed a tre- 
mendous waste because of the abuse of machinery 
and tools and because of spoiled pieces resulting 
from a low standard of work. It is said that a 
greater part of this waste could be eliminated if 
there was a higher degree of intelligence on the 
part of the workmen. Obviously, this is the point 
of view of the employer. The modern system of 
production has had much to do with such condi- 
tions. The absence of a definite system of factory 
training has its share of the responsibility. These 
questions have been discussed elsewhere. So 
much from the factory side. 

Boy economy. 

Meanwhile, the public school desires to hold its 
pupils, but youth wants to earn money, and par- 
ents ask the eternal question, *^What shall we do 
for our boy?^' The mother sees that if her boy 
goes to work in the average factory he is likely 
to fail to learn a trade, while it is almost posi- 
tive that he will shut the door against that fur- 
ther liberal education which he might get in the 
high school. The father and mother are earnest 
and willing to sacrifice heroically in order that 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 213 

their boy may go on to the high school ; but both 
are puzzled as to just what these four years will do 
for him. Their enquiry is serious and not un- 
usual. Now, let us imagine that the boy is able to 
say, ^^ Father, the problem is solved. The cooper- 
ative school is about to be opened. In it I will 
become a skillful machinist, able to earn more 
than a living immediately upon graduation and I 
will also have all the benefits of a high school edu- 
cation at the same time." This brings us to the 
cooperative system of industrial training. 

The plan of operation. 

The fundamental principle of the cooperative 
system is very simple. In brief it is this: the 
technique or the practical side of the work is 
taught only in a shop or store which is working 
under actual commercial conditions; the science 
underlying the technique is taught by skilled 
teachers in a public school. Every industrial 
center has a group of school buildings with its 
quota of trained teachers. It also has many 
factories and commercial houses that need skilled 
and efficient help. Under present conditions 
most of the children who leave the public schools 
go at once into the industries or stores and there 
is no connection whatever between shop and 
school. The children go to work for various 
reasons — some from personal inclination, others 



214 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

because they have to become breadwinners. In 
consequence, there are on one hand many children 
working in some capacity in store or factory, and 
on the other hand, a series of public schools car- 
ried on only for those who are fortunate enough 
to be able and to desire to continue in their school 
work. To many it seems feasible so to organize 
the public school system that it would be capable 
of dealing with all these children — those in school 
and those out of school. It would seem that a so- 
lution of the problem would be some system of co- 
operation between the schools and the factories for 
training these young people in industrial and 
civic efficiency after they have found their work. 
Naturally, there are details which need to be con- 
sidered for each particular industry or com- 
munity. Such questions arise as to who shall 
supply the school teachers — the shop or the pub- 
lic; the hours the student works in the shop; the 
hours he is taught in the school ; the periods of 
alternation of shop and school work, if alternating 
periods be used; and the curricula of the schools. 
These points are explained in the following 
description. 

An educational innovation. 

For several years, in connection with the en- 
gineering department of the University of Cin- 
cinnati, there has been in existence a system of 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 215 

cooperation between the shops of the city and 
the university whereby the shop takes charge of 
the practical training of the students and the uni- 
versity teaches the theory. The course is of six 
years' duration. There are six classes and there 
is one shop coordinator for each class. The shop 
coordinator is a college graduate acquainted with 
shop practice. He spends every morning at the 
university and every afternoon in the shops and 
his function is to make a direct weekly coordina- 
tion of the work of the shop with the technical 
work of the university. For example, one week 
he is at the shops of a local manufacturing com- 
pany where he observes the student apprentices 
at their work. He takes notice of what they are 
turning out, the speeds, feeds and cuts of the 
tools, the angles of the various tools, how the batch 
of work is ticketed and set up, the power drive — 
in fact, everything of importance in connection 
with the manufacturing of the product. The next 
week the students are grouped together for two 
school periods when there are explained to them 
the particular functions of the machines and tools 
with which they were working during the previous 
week in the shops. 

Meanwhile, the classroom teacher takes up all 
questions of speeds, feeds, cuts and required ac- 
curacy connected with the shop work. Tlie 
proper method of ticketing the batch of work is 



216 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

discussed and the system of shop routine is ex- 
plained. Ultimately, all problems of shop or- 
ganization and accounting, cost keeping, shop 
planning, power transmission, heating, ventilat- 
ing and lighting are discussed during the six 
years' course. In addition, a card system is em- 
ployed by means of which everything which the 
student does in the shop that exemplifies a theory 
taught in the university is brought to the atten- 
tion of the teacher, who takes every opportunity 
to impress upon the student the relationship be- 
tween theory and practice. It will be noted that 
out of the student's own experience is drawn much 
of his course in mechanism, thermodynamics, 
machine design and strength of materials. These 
subjects are a part of the college curriculum. 

Conflict of opinions. 

The cooperative effort between the university 
and the local shops has attracted much attention. 
In some respects it reminds one of the continu- 
ation school system in vogue in Munich. Its ad- 
vocates claim that it has a great advantage over 
the plan of the public trade school, for, by the 
methods employed, the school is relieved of the 
necessity of equipping its laboratories with ex- 
pensive machinery which in the course of ten or 
fifteen years may become obsolete. It is further 
claimed that the students are getting a practical 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 217 

training such as it is believed that no school can 
possibly furnish. They are working in actual 
commercially operated plants where the hum of 
industry is on every hand and where push and go 
are necessary for the student to hold his own in 
the shop organization. Those who favor this 
system believe that, granting that economic neces- 
sity will compel the public authorities to estab- 
lish such schools, the very extent to which a sys- 
tem of trade schools would have to be carried on 
in order to satisfy the necessities of all indus- 
tries, would militate against the possibility of 
maintaining such schools. 

The points referring to equipment and the prac- 
tical aspect of the instruction can be taken up 
later. But the rather plausible argument in the 
last statement against public trade schools is 
worth considering at this point, for it is the crux 
of the whole question of public trade schools. 
Naturally, school authorities will reply that only 
the more important trades need to be taught in 
a public school system. This brings up three 
questions: first, who shall decide what these 
trades are, and how shall the public support be 
obtained for these few trades? second, are the 
other trades to be neglected, leaving the desires 
of the children or their necessities entirely out of 
the question? third, shall only a few be educated 
in the more important trades and the rest al- 



218 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

lowed to shift for themselves as heretofore? 
The individual taxpayer, whose boy or girl wants 
to elect a trade which the schools do not teach, 
will demand an equal right to the sort of educa- 
tion desired for his child that is provided in 
other directions for other children. The ques- 
tion has been asked at various times whether 
a citizen has not the same right to demand that 
the public schools shall teach his son to be a 
printer as some one else has the right to demand 
that his son be taught to be a machinist. Shall 
the public school system say to the boy: ^^You 
must be a machinist, plumber, molder or wood- 
worker, or go without a trade training,'' — just 
because the local trade school happens to have 
only these four trades in its curriculum? 

Such questions should not be difficult to an- 
swer. If there is public demand for a class in 
plumbing or printing or bricklaying, and there 
are twenty boys ready to join a class, it is feasible 
to start such a class in a special school, along 
with other classes, in the same way that the pub- 
lic now provides for the special needs of students 
preparing for the entrance requirements of our 
colleges and professional schools. One may 
visit many a high school where a fifteen hundred 
dollar teacher is giving instruction in Greek, or 
spherical trigonometry to a class of four pupils. 
Likewise expensively equipped laboratories in ad- 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 219 

vanced chemistry are often in use by less tiian 
half a dozen pupils. After all, the point of view 
often determines educational procedure. 

Moreover, it is possible so to group the various 
trades and occupations as to make comparatively 
few courses of instruction cover the educational 
needs of many lines of industrial activity. An 
analysis of any vocation, whether it requires ex- 
tensive or intensive preparation, will show that 
back of it lies a body of technical information 
which is within limits of the capacity and need 
of each worker. Such studies constitute voca- 
tional tools and may be used in a majority of 
specialized occupations when the latter are 
grouped so that each one represents certain dis- 
tinctive processes connected with common mate- 
rials. There is, for example, the wood-working 
group, the iron and steel working group, the clay 
and furnace working group, the cloth making 
group, etc. 

Advantages of both. 

There are well defined and distinct advantages 
in both systems of industrial training — coopera- 
tive and trade school. It is hardly necessary 
for partisans on either side to overreach in their 
arguments. The real issue at stake is not 
whether the cooperative system is the only proper 
system of training, but rather, to what extent 



220 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

can each system find its proper place in American 
education. There is room for both, and an anal- 
ysis of the principles involved is well worth while 
at this point. 

Standpoint of equipment. 

Undoubtedly, the cooperative system is eco- 
nomical from the standpoint of school equip- 
ment. It places upon the taxpayer almost no 
burden of taxation, as the existing equipment of 
commercial shops is used. Moreover, it places 
upon the public school authorities no great prob- 
lems which are entirely novel and untried and 
which may require the expenditure of public 
money along new channels. In some lines of in- 
dustry the equipment will become obsolete in from 
seven to ten years and to properly teach the 
trades in schools will mean the remodelling, to 
some extent at least, of the equipment at least 
once in this period of time. It is stated by Dean 
Schneider of the engineering department of the 
University of Cincinnati that twice the number of 
students are taught under the cooperative system 
at two-thirds the cost of the former system of 
school shops and. that it turns out practical en- 
gineers which the old system could not do. The 
cooperative plan will allow the money that was 
formerly sunk in physical equipment to be re- 



CO-OPEKATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 221 

placed every few years, to be used in paying 
higher salaries to superior teachers. 

It is obvious, of course, that trade schools are 
necessarily somewhat expensive. The same may 
be said of dental, medical, agricultural and me- 
chanic arts schools. But it is doubtful if the 
public will be willing to make any unjust discrim- 
inations based upon financial considerations 
against a necessary and proper industrial train- 
ing of the mass of our people who work in the 
great constructive industries, in favor of those 
who are engaged in professional work. One 
might as well say, ^^Do away with our medical 
schools and let the students practice on the pub- 
lic and pick up their profession, for these schools 
are expensive and the apparatus and medical the- 
ories become obsolete every few years.'' 

Standpoint of teachers. 

Furthermore, it is claimed that educational 
waste will be avoided in the cooperative system 
by using foremen in the shops as teachers of shop- 
work rather than teachers specially trained. To 
quote from Dean Schneider: ''Such waste ought 
to be avoided just the same as waste of material 
resources. And it would be educational waste to 
try to imitate shop conditions and shop practice 
in our public schools upon a large scale, such as 



222 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

specific trade education requires, if such school- 
ing is to amount to anything, when there is a lack 
of a sufficient number of pedagogically trained 
teachers. ' ' Undoubtedly, the merely academically 
trained teacher cannot teach a trade. On the 
other hand the practical mechanic without peda- 
gogical training may be able to impart to the stu- 
dent the mechanical manipulations of his trade, 
but he cannot make the proper connection with the 
pedagogic end of his work, and he will be deficient 
to that extent. 

But it must be remembered that every new 
educational movement has suffered at its incep- 
tion from the lack of skilled teachers. This was 
true in the early days of the movement looking 
towards the teaching of science, manual training 
and commercial branches in our schools. It is 
hardly necessary to hesitate in a new movement 
because of an insufficient supply of teachers. Of 
course at present there are few teachers because 
there are few schools demanding them. But the 
law of supply and demand will adjust this matter. 
No one can expect that a thousand young men are 
going to prepare themselves for teaching in 
trade schools when there may not be a hundred 
positions at present in view requiring such men. 
The question of training suitable teachers is 
taken up in the last chapter. 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 223 

Wasting time and money. 

Another point in favor of the cooperative sys- 
tem — one which comes under the head of educa- 
tional waste — refers to the fallacy of attempting 
to give specific trade education to a boy of six- 
teen years of age when he does not know what 
trade he wants to learn, or when he can hardly 
afford to spend three or four years in a trade 
school without compensation. It is stated that on 
entering a shop he would receive low wages in- 
stead of the high wages which he expected, be- 
cause of the lack of that practical experience 
which can be acquired only in the commercial 
shop. The record of the graduates of trade 
schools answers this argument. 

Moreover, another weakness of the public trade 
school is said to be the break in the continuity of 
systematic mental effort which will exist between 
the period at which the boy drops out of school at 
fourteen and the trade school period when the 
boy enters it at sixteen; this lack of continuity 
forcing the trade school to gather up the inter- 
rupted, loose and disorganized threads of mental 
activity. If the advocates of the cooperative sys- 
tem feel that they must oppose the public trade 
school movement by such an argument, they have 
at least furnished a valuable contribution toward 
an argument for vocational training between 



224 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

fourteen and sixteen. In fact, no stronger argu- 
ment could be used. Such training is intended 
to arouse a set of industrial interests which will 
require specific trade training for their satisfac- 
tion; the latter training to be given either in the 
trade school, open to pupils who are sixteen years 
of age, or in the shops themselves. There will 
be less educational waste to the boy, as well as 
less economic waste to the public, if he is in some 
school where he is discovering his probable voca- 
tional pursuit instead of wasting two years in a 
line of work which does not give him a chance, 
educationally speaking, to discover himself. 

Learn and earn. 

Open to boys who are sixteen years of age, the 
cooperative system makes one strong appeal. It 
gives them an opportunity of earning something. 
They are earning while learning, whereas under 
the trade school system they do not earn until 
they have completed their trade education. The 
cooperative system makes it possible for a child 
to continue in school whereas now he is compelled 
to take a low grade, poorly paid, unskilled posi- 
tion perhaps without any future prospects either 
in money or the acquirement of skill. 

Evidently at first sight it would appear that the 
cooperative plan, involving the city in practically 
no expense and paying wages to the boys, was by 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 225 

far tlie least wasteful. For example, in the Fitch- 
burg, Massachusetts plan, which is described 
later, the boys give four years' time and in re- 
turn receive $544.50 in wages and are taught a 
trade besides. On the other hand, in a public 
trade school, it might take the same number of 
years to learn the trade, but the boys would not 
receive any money. Assuming that the boy may 
continue to work for thirty years after leaving 
the school, the sum of $544.50 spread over thirty 
years amounts to about six cents a day. There- 
fore, it only becomes a question of whether the 
boy, trained in a public trade school, can earn six 
cents a day more on the average than the boy 
trained under the cooperative system. The ad- 
vocates of the public school idea claim that the 
difference between their boy, who is under an in- 
structor whose business it is to teach the trade, 
and the boy trained in a shop, who is under a 
foreman whose business it is to get work out, will 
make the six cents difference look small. 

Cooperation between shop and school. 

The cooperative system will naturally serve to 
keep the business men and employers in constant 
touch with the public school system if for no 
other reason than the selfish incentive to get the 
most out of it for themselves. Given an oppor- 
tunity to cooperate, it is expected that they will 



226 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

study the schools with their own needs in mind, 
and as one result they may possibly become inter- 
ested and aroused enough to keep reactionary 
elements out of boards of education as well as to 
secure larger school appropriations. But if the 
employers^ as a whole, do not exhibit an interest 
in the schools, at least there can be coordination 
between the school instructor and the shop force. 
So far, in carrying out the cooperative plan in the 
cities which have tried it, the instructors have 
been acquainted with the local shop practice. 
They spend part of the time in the shop 
and part of the time in the school. It is 
their business to observe the students at their 
work, to study the shop system and any technical 
matter of interest, noting particularly the every- 
day shop applications of the various sciences, 
such as mathematics, physics, chemistry and draw- 
ing. This enables them to select examples and 
subjects for instruction which vitally interest the 
boys and hold their attention, as they see the rea- 
son for the given problems of the classroom. As 
an illustration, take the teaching of the upright 
drill. A large drawing of one is made so that all 
can see it ; then each student has a trade catalogue 
of this drill and turns to it while the instructor 
shows how to find the speed of each shaft and of 
the drill. In general, catalogues of machine tools 
are used very freely as reading lessons and in 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OP TRAINING 227 

such other ways as will familiarize the boys with 
the different tools. 

Sentiment of trade unions. 

It has been believed that the cooperative sys- 
tem would not be opposed by the trade unionists. 
One would hardly expect that they would oppose 
a scheme that takes a young person who has al- 
ready obtained a foothold in a trade and gives 
him instruction in a school that makes for greater 
industrial efficiency. Nevertheless, at the pres- 
ent writing the scheme has not received the hearty 
endorsement of the labor unions — at least, if one 
may judge by the statement in the special report 
on industrial education of the American Feder- 
ation of Labor: ^^Any scheme of education 
which depends for its carrying out on a private 
group, subject to no public control, leaves un- 
solved the fundamental democratic problem of 
giving the boys of the country an equal oppor- 
tunity and the citizens the power to criticize and 
reform their educational machinery. '^ Undoubt- 
edly, the committee that wrote this report felt 
that it was justified in condemning any system 
of public instruction, privately controlled, or any 
scheme of private selection of pupils. As will be 
seen later in the description of the Beverly and 
Fitchburg schools, the scope of the cooperative in- 
struction in these cities does not appear to be dedi- 



228 THE WORKER AND TPIE STATE 

cated to the common interests of all without con- 
ditions and reservations. 

Application to other trades. 

It is expected that the cooperative system can 
be applied not only to the machine trades but also 
to the tailoring, baking, butchering, building or 
any other trade, where the mechanical equipment 
or natural conditions are somewhat different 
from the trades which have already adopted the 
system. Already a department store in New 
York City has introduced a system which is 
suggestive of what might be done by cooperation 
between public school authorities and private con- 
cerns. In common with most stores of this class, 
the clerks are not very busy until ten o'clock in the 
morning ; hence, the store can easily get along with 
one-half of its clerks, from eight to ten o'clock 
one-half of them receiving two hours' instruction 
daily for a week while the other section is work- 
ing, alternating the following week with the other 
half of the clerks. In this case, the students do 
not go to school but the teachers go to the stores. 
Some of the large rooms, such as carpet and lace 
rooms, are being used as schoolrooms, the chairs 
being removed at ten o'clock, but sufficient space 
reserved for any business that may be necessary 
up to that time. Among other things the sales- 
people are taught psychology of salesmanship, 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TEAINING 229 

and are given as much technical knowledge as pos- 
sible of the things they are selling. In addition, 
they receive a certain amount of general educa- 
tion. 

An interesting experiment. 

Three years ago the Women's Educational and 
Industrial Union of Boston started a class in 
salesmanship. It consisted of eight young girls. 
These girls were so young that at the close of the 
three months' course, those who did succeed in 
finding store positions had to go in as stock or 
cash girls. The only regular selling experience 
had been in the food salesroom and the handwork 
shop managed in connection with the Union, and 
there was no definite connection with the stores. 
Later it was felt that actual store experience was 
necessary and also some guarantee that candi- 
dates who succeeded in the stores would be as- 
sured positions. 

Finally, in 1908, one of the largest dry goods 
stores offered to cooperate. It agreed to take the 
Union class on Mondays, giving them experience 
and a small compensation, and also expressed a 
willingness to consider promising candidates for 
positions in its store, and every opportunity was 
given to the director of the class to gain expe- 
rience by selling goods in that store. Later, five 
other stores extended their assistance. The 



230 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

superintendents of these stores formed an advis- 
ory committee, meeting once a month with the 
president of the Union and the director of the 
class, for discussion and conference. The policy, 
as planned with the advisory committee, was that 
candidates, if approved by the director, should be 
sent to the Union class from the stores and ad- 
mitted to the school. After one month in the 
class, candidates were promised store experience 
on Mondays in the store which had accepted 
them, and the stores paid for this service one dol- 
lar per day. They were also guaranteed perma- 
nent positions in these stores at the close of the 
course if their work was satisfactory after one 
month's probation. 

The aim of the present course is first, to de- 
velop wholesome, attractive personalities; and 
hygiene, especially personal hygiene, is taught, 
including study of daily menus for saleswomen, 
ventilation, bathing, sleep, exercise, and recrea- 
tion : second, to become familiar with the general 
system of stores ; sales slip practice, store direct- 
ory, business forms and cash accounts: third, to 
increase knowledge of store stock, its color, de- 
sign, and textiles : fourth, to study selling as a 
science, including discussion of store experiences, 
talks on salesmanship, such as attitude to firm, 
customer and fellow employee, demonstration of 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 231 

selling in class and salesmanship lectures: fifth, 
to get the right attitude towards the work. 

At present the course extends for four months, 
with a daily session of three hours. Demonstra- 
tion of selling is conducted like the teaching les- 
sons in normal schools. Eeal customers, chosen 
because they represent different types, buy real 
articles. The sale is watched by the class, notes 
being taken of strong and weak points. Natur- 
ally, the note-book work gives good material for 
study of English expression, including spelling, 
punctuation and penmanship. When the sale is 
finished, the one who has made the sale is allowed 
to criticize her own work, then the class criticizes, 
the customer tells why she did or did not buy the 
article, and the whole is summed up by the direc- 
tor. As far as possible the class work is correl- 
ated: the drawing work consists of store plans 
and designs for costumes ; the spelling brings out 
names and addresses and store English; when 
the girls are sent to various stores for samples, 
salesmanship, color, design and textiles are 
studied. The manner of the salesman in giving 
the sample is observed and reported, the color 
and design are used in the color lesson and the 
material in the textile work. If the textile being 
studied is wool, one of the store lectures at that 
time will be on wool or woolen goods. Practical 



232 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

talks by experienced salespeople, buyers and 
superintendents are given twice a week to the 
class on subjects such as "The Department 
Store's System and Saleswoman's Place in It," 
^^How to show Goods," "Trifles," "Textiles," 
"Service to Customer." 

Already some of the store superintendents ad- 
mit that three well trained saleswomen can man- 
age a counter better than six indifferent ones, 
and that three well trained women with good 
salaries cost the store no more than the six ineffi- 
cient ones. Moreover, women looking upon sales- 
manship as a vocation, with ambition to advance, 
will command higher wages; conversely, stores 
offering higher wages will demand trained work- 
ers. It is believed that ultimately this will mean 
increased business for the stores, better service 
to the public and a higher standard of living for 
the workers. 

A plan for high schools. 

The Cincinnati cooperative scheme is planned 
with reference to the needs of university students 
in engineering. The Fitchburg, Massachusetts, 
plan of cooperative industrial education is an ar- 
rangement between the high school authorities 
and the local manufacturers of metal machinery, 
saws, engines, pumps and condensers and other 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 233 

metal products. It covers a four years' course. 
In the first year it is all school work; the next 
three years school and shopwork, with one week 
in school and one week in the shop. The boys 
work in pairs; for example, a shop taking eight 
apprentices, has four working at all times. Some 
definite plan is required to make a smooth run- 
ning system of alternation. The boy who is in the 
school one week and expects to work in the shop 
the next week, goes to the shop on Saturday be- 
fore closing time for an hour and watches the job 
his alternate is on. He is then prepared to take 
up on Monday morning the operations with which 
he has previously made himself familiar and has 
gained from his foreman such additional infor- 
mation as he feels he may need. This plan dif- 
fers from the public trade school, where any 
student may enter and go entirely through a 
three or four years' course without regard to his 
mechanical ability or fitness for such work, in that 
the employers drop out the ^^dead wood" and 
allow only those to remain who will make high 
grade mechanics. It is a close copy of the Cin- 
cinnati plan, except that the boys are younger, 
the school work is of high school grade only, and 
the aim is to train mechanics and not engineers. 
So far as the pairing of the boys and the alterna- 
tion of work between school and shop are con- 



234 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

cerned, the methods are identical. Candidates for 
the course are restricted to those who have finished 
the grammar school work and so far as actual 
starting upon the shop work is concerned, the 
restriction with reference to the first year elimi- 
nates all who have not completed a full year in 
the high school. This academic restriction, com- 
bined with the requirement of the satisfactory 
completion of a two months' trial term in the 
shops in the second year, serves to eliminate un- 
satisfactory material. This trial period is ex- 
actly the same as is common in the regular ap- 
prenticeship agreements. If the boy does not 
care to continue he may stop, and if the manu- 
facturer feels that the boy will not succeed as a 
mechanic he is told to leave. A formal inden- 
tured apprenticeship agreement is executed sub- 
ject to the apprentice doing satisfactory work in 
both school and shop. This bond impresses the 
apprentice with the fact that he has entered into a 
business agreement, approved and guaranteed by 
his parents. The rates of pay for the three years 
of cooperative shop work and for the actual time 
spent in the shops are as follows: For the first 
year ten cents per hour, for the second year eleven 
cents per hour and for the third year twelve and 
one-half cents per hour. While the half-time plan 
is carried out during the school year, full time 
work is provided for the apprentices during the 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 235 

school vacations, except that a two weeks' vaca- 
tion is given them each summer. 

Since the school time is only twenty weeks a 
year it is evident that only such subjects can be 
taught as are of practical value to the student in 
the pursuit of his livelihood. The manufacturers 
insisted that the bookwork be such as would make 
the boys better mechanics, capable of advancing 
to the highest possibilities in the trade and that 
all superfluous subjects be left out. They have 
said ^^ better a little done well than a smattering 
of a large variety of subjects." The regular 
courses of study in the high school were discarded, 
precedent was ignored and such subjects were se- 
lected as would fit the students to be intelligent 
mechanics. 

The hook studies. 

English is given throughout the four years in 
order that the boy may speak and write intelli- 
gently various forms of business papers and shop 
terms. If he applies for a position the form in 
which he presents that application will largely 
determine whether or not it will be considered. 
Again, the mechanic who is sent out to do a job 
on his own responsibility is often required to 
make written reports to his employers. The 
course in current events and industrial history 
deals with the daily happenings in the industrial 



236 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

world, the history of the iron industry, factory 
system and labor problems, new inventions and 
the reading of mechanical journals. 

The mathematics begins with simple proposi- 
tions in mensuration, fractions, metric system, 
circular measure. It extends into general shop 
mathematics, dealing with problems on cutting, 
speeds, feeds, belting, gearing, strength of ma- 
terials and general cost figuring. Algebra is 
then taken up to give facility in using the for- 
mulae so common in the trade journals and hand- 
books, leading up to simple applications of geom- 
etry and trigonometry. The practice rather than 
the theory of mathematical science is sought. 

The work in mechanism treats of the construc- 
tion and uses of the various machine tools that 
every shop contains. The names and uses of 
every part are learned in the school as well as in 
the shop. The reason for the shapes of the va- 
rious parts, kinds of material used in their con- 
struction, shapes and kinds of tools used and their 
cutting action, is clearly pointed out. 

The chemistry takes up the nature and qualities 
of metals and salts, with consideration of the 
tests that ordinarily can be applied to fractured 
metals, hardening and tempering processes. 

Commercial geography includes the study of 
the source of supply of materials of the various 
industries, preparation and methods of transpor- 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 237 

tation, including railway systems and water- 
ways. 

A course in first aid to the injured is given, for 
there is no place where accidents are more liable 
to happen than in the shop and some knowledge 
of how to care for them is a valuable asset to the 
workman. 

Naturally, a strong course in drawing is of- 
fered, as it is the sign language of the mechanic, 
for almost invariably in explaining an object or 
piece of work he takes his pencil and makes, or 
attempts to make, a drawing to reenforce his re- 
marks. A large share of the drawing course is 
given to freehand work. It begins with simple 
objects and then takes up machine parts. In this 
way the boy sees the object and at the same time 
becomes familiar with the proportions and shapes 
of ordinary machine parts. Later he draws them 
mechanically with instruments to scale. 

In the course in business methods there is the 
study of the organization of shop systems, in- 
cluding the receiving of materials, laying out of 
work, tagging, inspecting and routine of work 
through the shop. In this way the boy sees the 
dependence of one department on the other; the 
necessity for the cooperation of all to insure good 
results. He appreciates the cost of doing busi- 
ness and he sees that it is not all profit and it 
costs something to erect and equip a manfactur- 



238 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

ing plant, conduct an office and maintain a corps 
of salesmen and advertising agents. 

It is to be noted that the actual instruction in 
shopwork is by the shop foremen in the various 
local shops, as the number of boys at work in 
any shop is not sufficient to justify the employment 
of a shop teacher; the extenuating circumstances 
being that the local manufacturing enterprises 
are not of that great magnitude which leads to an 
apprentice being lost sight of. Moreover, as an 
important safeguard, the school instructor reg- 
ularly visits the shops and supervises the work 
given to the boys. The apprentices are given to 
understand that they are at full liberty to com- 
plain to the class teacher in case they are not 
satisfied with the work given them. In this way 
substantial check is placed upon the tendency to 
make an apprentice into a stockroom clerk or 
otherwise give him work not in accordance with 
the spirit of the apprenticeship agreement. These 
papers, signed by both manufacturer and appren- 
tice specify that the boy shall be taught the fund- 
amental operations of various shop tools and proc- 
esses under competent foremen — a provision that 
is usually lacking in apprenticeship papers. 

A valid objection. 

There is an apparent onesidedness in this agree- 
ment between apprentice and employer which it 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 239 

appears might be avoided. While it may be said 
that all these employers are men of known in- 
tegrity, on the other hand, the success of the whole 
scheme depends entirely on their doing what they 
ought to do. 

Undoubtedly there is much of value in the co- 
operative scheme, but before it can have general 
endorsement, the public must be assured that 
the plan is so worked out that it results in all- 
around training and that the half-time idea 
does not become a half-way scheme. To the 
careful observer, a plan by which the pupils are 
indentured under a forfeit to stay four years 
is hampered in various ways for, on the whole, 
it is less favorable to the apprentices than to the 
manufacturers. The pupils that are merely 
taken into the shops on the half-time, or cooper- 
ative plan, may not receive that systematic and 
progressive advancement in learning the differ- 
ent parts of the industry that is desirable. To 
a certain extent, the pupils may be exploited for 
the benefit of the manufacturer, for the money 
value of the product of the boy's labor often 
seems to be more determinative to the manufac- 
turer, than the pupil's progress in learning the 
trade. On the other hand, in a public trade school 
where the work is not carried on under the con- 
ditions of a real factory it may be impossible for 
the pupil to attain a practical skill and efficiency 



240 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

equal to that of a good workman in a factory. 
Of course much depends on the way the school is 
conducted. Unless the method of instruction in 
the average school is different from that at pres- 
ent in vogue in most of our manual training 
schools, the workman's time, as a factor in the 
cost of production, can never be sufficiently dem- 
onstrated to a pupil where his presence and 
wages do not depend upon his active productive 
ability. Neither can the time that may properly 
be used and the skill required for the different 
operations be sufficiently understood by the pupil 
until the product is put to actual commercial use 
and the pupil rewarded for his work in proportion 
to his perception and adjustment of these factors 
of production. This is the strongest argument 
for the cooperative plan. 

A public trade school must establish and main- 
tain its own standards of efficiency in workman- 
ship and production, and its own esprit de corps 
among its students and its own standards of 
scholarship and equipment, while the industrial 
school that is affiliated with a first class factory 
on the one hand and a first class school on the 
other, without being dominated by either factory 
or school, has constantly before its pupils the best 
standards, both industrial and educational, which 
must be powerful incentives to the pupils of the 
school. 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 241 

A tetter plan. 

The Massachusetts Commission on Industrial 
Education in 1909 endorsed a cooperative scheme 
between the public school authorities of Beverly, 
Massachusetts, and a local industry. It is an ex- 
cellent example of what a small city can do for 
industrial education and of a way in which man- 
ufacturing interests and school authorities can co- 
operate to mutual advantage in solving a trouble- 
some educational problem. Beverly is a small 
city of some 17,000 inhabitants. In manufactur- 
ing there are but two industries — the making of 
shoes and the making of shoe machinery. The 
latter is by far the more important, employing 
some 3,000 men and occupying a new and thor- 
oughly modern plant. A proposal was made to 
city authorities by the United Shoe Machinery 
Company. This proposal was: ^'A separate de- 
partment will be organized in the factory of the 
United Shoe Machinery Company and equipped 
with all necessary machine tools for the accom- 
modation of twenty-five boys at one time. Two 
groups of twenty-five will alternate between the 
factory and the schoolhouse. The Company will 
furnish all material and keep the accounts as pro- 
posed, and purchase the products at established 
prices. The United Shoe Machinery Company 
will make up the deficit between the earnings of 
the factory shop as shown by the account de- 



242 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

scribed above and the cost of maintenance of the 
factory shop including the salary of the instruct- 
ors while in the shop. The hiring of the shop 
instructor or foreman will be in the hands of a 
local committee on industrial education.'' In 
the plan as put into operation the management 
and control of the school are vested in a board 
of trustees, composed of the Mayor, five mem- 
bers of the school committee and one or more 
citizens appointed by the Mayor. It is provided 
that each proprietor of an industry who pro- 
vides shop facilities satisfactory to the trustees 
shall be represented by one member of the board, 
nominated by the proprietor of the industry and 
appointed by the Mayor. The school is divided 
into two classes of twenty-five each. One class 
reports to the shop for a week's work, the other 
to the schoolroom for a week's instruction; at 
the end of the week the classes change places. 
Schoolroom facilities are provided in the high 
school building and include the use of regular 
high school equipment for the teaching of drawing, 
blueprinting, physics, chemistry, business forms 
and methods and the like. The city set aside a 
small classroom with desks for twenty-five boys, 
representing a cost of perhaps a few hundred 
dollars. On the other hand, the United Shoe Ma- 
chinery Company set aside a much larger amount 
of floor space and an equipment of machine tools 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 243 

representing an aggregate value of about fifteen 
thousand dollars. In the high school the boys 
are taught mechanical drawing, shop mathe- 
matics, fundamentals of physics and chemistry, 
English, business forms. The school day is of 
eight hours for five days a week. Saturday is 
given as a full holiday. No home lessons are re- 
quired. At the factory the aim is to teach skill 
in the trade under actual shop conditions. Thus 
regular machine parts are selected involving 
operations suitable for instruction and sent to the 
school shop department. Here they are given to 
the boys together with the regular outfit of jigs, 
fixtures and other special tools which are used 
in a regular manufacturing department. No 
changes whatever are made from regular shop 
manufacturing conditions. The boy takes his job 
and may at first perform only one operation 
until he has mastered the use of the various tools. 
After that is done he takes his job and carries it 
through, operation after operation, until the part 
is finished. As a rule, if a job is not finished dur- 
ing the week in which he is in the shop, it is laid 
aside until he comes again. In special cases it 
may be finished by another boy in the school shop 
or sent to a manufacturing department. Each op- 
eration is inspected by a regular shop inspector 
under exactly the same conditions and with exactly 
the same care as if the work came from a manufac- 



244 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

turing department. In this way the atmosphere, 
hours, methods, accuracy and efficiency of the 
shops are constantly with a boy throughout his 
entire course in the shop school department. All 
of the work furnished is piece-work and the boys 
are paid one-half of the regular piece-work rates ; 
the other half is withheld as a partial reimburse- 
ment to the company for the expense of main- 
taining the department. On this basis the boys 
average while in the shop two dollars and fifty 
cents to three dollars per week in wages, the 
amount of the earnings depending largely upon 
the energy and diligence of the boys. There are 
two instructors, one for each class, and each in- 
structor stays with his class, alternating between 
the shop and the schoolroom. The instructor 
knows what work each boy has done in the shop 
and is able to adapt the schoolroom instruction to 
it, to explain and fix the principles upon which 
the shopwork was based. At the same time he 
has no chance to become merely a teacher and 
grow away from the shop; or merely a shop in- 
structor and grow away from the classroom view- 
point. 

Advantages, 

An attempt has been made to have real coopera- 
tion between the school authorities and the manu- 
facturer; there has been no heavy burden placed 



CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEM OF TRAINING 245 

upon the taxpayers of the city for equipment ; the 
school authorities have had no complex problems 
in trade teaching to face and solve ; and the shop 
has not attempted to add school training to a 
manufacturing business. The boys get their 
school training where they always have received 
it, in the school; and again, they get their shop 
training where trades have always been taught in 
the shop. 

A summing up. 

The cooperative system has tremendous ad- 
vantages. In presenting it an attempt has been 
made to be fair to both the public trade school and 
the so-called ^^ Cincinnati scheme.'' Certainly the 
plan is worth trying. It is very largely based 
upon a German method. The success of the Ger- 
man system is due not only to the fostering care of 
a central government but in a large measure to 
social and economic conditions inherent in the 
situation. In that country it is taken as a matter 
of course that employers and schools will work 
together to promote thorough industrial training. 
In such an atmosphere the cooperative scheme 
can achieve its highest development. In America 
conditions are different. Employers have not 
taken, up to the present time, any great interest 
in the work of the public schools except to criti- 
cize them. Neither have school men taken any 



246 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

interest in the labor conditions in our industries. 
Evidently the cooperative system offers a means 
of getting together. But if the school author- 
ities adopt this plan simply to avoid spending 
public money, and employers take up the scheme 
in order to throw the burden of responsibility for 
obtaining skilled labor upon the public schools, 
simply because they have been negligent in the 
past in doing what may have been their duty, 
then the scheme is doomed to failure. The co- 
operative plan must get beyond selfish, personal 
motives if it is to be a part of an American sys- 
tem of education. Primarily the schools are 
managed in the interests of its boys and girls. 
There is no cause for dampening the ardor of 
those that favor the cooperative system, but no 
association of employers can be allowed to dic- 
tate a system of public education unless it be 
along the lines which are of direct personal ad- 
vantage to the boys and girls. Then it will not 
be dictation, but cooperation, which is welcome 
to us all. 



VIII 
SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 

IT is commonly stated in America that the 
practice of indenturing apprentices for the 
purpose of giving young men instruction in the 
art and mastery of a trade has become obsolete. 
Moreover it is claimed that, with the beginning 
of production on a larger scale in the manufactur- 
ing plants which succeeded the earlier workshops 
of the first part of the nineteenth century, the 
apprentice ceased to exist except in name, and 
the term is now loosely applied to young workers 
in a factory, not there to learn the definite proc- 
esses of a trade, but to operate machines which 
have displaced the skilled adult journeymen. 
Certain it is that with the introduction of labor- 
saving machinery the old system of apprentice- 
ship declined, and where it did exist, it changed 
form so that the indenture was no longer a legal 
relation. 

Passing of the old order. 

Nor have the rapidly changing industrial con- 
ditions of the past hundred years been such that 

247^ 



248 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

the personal relation between the master and the 
apprentice could be preserved. A century ago 
a master workman could agree ' ' to teach the craft 
without any concealment.'' He knew the whole 
of his trade and had the chance to practise it 
every day. But shop conditions of that time were 
vastly different from those of to-day. There 
was little subdivision of labor and no elaborate 
factory system. With the universal adoption of 
labor-saving machinery it became possible for 
many untaught hands to turn out the work in the 
rough for the skilled few to finish. This new 
method of production prevented the young ap- 
prentice from securing definite instruction. He 
could not look to his employer or superintendent 
as these had numerous other interests ; nor could 
he turn to the journeymen, as few journeymen 
were willing to take the time to teach a young 
factory hand while laboring on piece work or at 
fixed wages with the demand that a certain mini- 
mum amount be accomplished in a day. 

The days when clerks were articled, when boys 
were bound for a term of four to seven 
years with the carpenter, tailor, shoemaker, 
blacksmith and wheelwright, and learned their 
trade from the thorough instruction of their 
master, not picking it up by observation as the 
*^ helper" or ^^ assistant" often does to-day, are 
a part of the old order which has given place to 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 249 

the new industrialism. It is to be regretted that 
with the passing of the old form, no general pro- 
vision was made for giving instruction in the 
trades so necessary for the transfer of skill from 
one generation of workers to the next. 

Early apprenticeship. 

The beginnings of apprenticeship are not clearly 
defined. When the workman rose out of slav- 
ery, some division must necessarily have been 
made between learners and experts. In the four- 
teenth century the craft guilds had a well defined 
system of teaching beginners. Their indentures 
show that the apprentice bound himself from four 
to eight years to do the master's bidding and 
to be economical in the use of goods, also to be- 
have himself in a seemly manner, and not to 
carouse or gamble. In return the master agreed 
to furnish him all necessary food, clothing and 
shelter ; also to teach him the art and mystery of 
the trade. He was a part of the master's family, 
and for his conduct in the city, his master was re- 
sponsible to the civic authorities. 

The following form of indenture of that period 
is of interest : 

^'This indenture made the XIII day of Sep- 
tember in the year of the reign of King Edward 
the Ilird between John Gare of Saint Mary Cray 
in the County of Kent, cordwainer on that one 



250 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

partie and Walter Byse, son of John Byse, sum- 
tyme of Wimelton, in the same County, fuller on 
that other partie, Witnesseth that the saide 
Walter hath covenanted with the said John Gare 
for the time of VIII yeres, and that the saide 
John Gare shall find the saide Walter mete and 
drink and clothing during the saide time as to 
the saide Walter shall be according. Also the 
saide John Gare shall teche the saide Walter his 
craft, as he may and can and also the saide John 
Gare shall give him the first yere of the said VIII 
yeres iiid (3d) in money, and the second yere 
vid (6d) and so after the rate of iiid to an yere, 
and the last yere of the saide VIII yeres the saide 
John Gare shall give unto the saide Walter x shil- 
lings of money. And the saide Walter shall well 
and truly kepe his occupacy on, and do such things 
as the saide John shall bid him do, as unto the 
saide Walter shall be lawful and lefull, and the 
saide Walter shall be none ale goer anyther to no 
rebeld nor sports during the saide VIII yeres 
without the license of the saide John. In wit- 
ness whereof, the parties aforesaide chaungeable 
have put their seals this days and yeres above- 
saide.'* 

Its decadence. 

The gradual decadence of this former method 
of teaching boys the knowledge of a craft may be 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 251 

ascribed to various causes, all of which have their 
roots in the economic changes wrought by ma- 
chine industry. In general, they may be summed 
up as follows: first, production on a large scale 
which destroys the personal relations between 
employer and employee or master and appren- 
tice; second, the extensive use of machinery and 
subdivision of labor; third, the unwillingness of 
employers to take on apprentices ; fourth, the un- 
willingness of journeymen to instruct apprentices ; 
and fifth, the dislike of boys for apprenticeship. 
These points will be taken up in order. 

Absence of personal relations. 

In olden times the apprentice was under the 
direct supervision and responsibility of his mas- 
ter, for his training and his moral conduct. Such 
close personal relations between apprentice and 
master, under the modern system of production 
on a large scale, is utterly impracticable. The 
employer is no longer responsible for the training 
and conduct of the apprentice, even in cases where 
the apprentice is duly indentured. The duty 
of supervising the training of the apprentice in 
modern workshops is relegated either to the fore- 
man or to the journeymen, or it is entirely neg- 
lected. The speed and stress under which modern 
industry proceeds do not permit the journeymen 
to be diverted from their labor in order to look 



252 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

after the apprentice's instruction. Consequently, 
the apprentice, instead of being trained to do 
journeymen's work, is not uncommonly given odd 
jobs around the shop, acting as errand boy and 
handy man. The boy soon realizes this condition 
and applies for work on the automatic machine 
where he can do piece work and where he can 
earn more even if he cannot learn as much. 

Revolution of industry, 

Eobert Louis Stevenson has said, ^^If a man 
love the labor of any trade, apart from any ques- 
tion of success or fame, the gods have called him." 
But what about the man that awakens some morn- 
ing to find a machine standing in his place doing 
the work which he performed the day before? 
Inventions have been introduced so rapidly and 
extensively during the last ten years that many 
trades have been almost revolutionized. The 
rapid introduction of machinery has a tendency 
to depress wages, at least temporarily, and labor 
organizations are constantly endeavoring to com- 
bat this tendency. This lack of security has been 
the cause of many a mechanic advising his boy to 
enter business or professional life. 

While the new processes of manufacture may 
temporarily embarrass numbers of industrial 
workers, in some trades at least the increased 
need of skilled men, resulting from these indus- 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 253 

trial changes, will readily furnish employment to 
the same workers, providing they have the re- 
quisite mechanical adaptability. It is the unani- 
mous opinion of machine tool manufacturers that 
a certain number of all-around workmen are 
needed, even where extensive specialization is em- 
ployed. They state that the demand for men 
broadly trained and having considerable industrial 
intelligence is increasing. 

Attitude of employer. 

Owing to this disintegration of trades neither 
employers nor employees are particularly de- 
sirous of having apprentices in the workshop. 
The implied expense of training apprentices, to- 
gether with the losses frequently resulting from 
material spoiled by them, or the impossibility of 
marketing their product, leads employers to seek 
additional mechanics from laborers and helpers 
rather than train apprentices for this purpose. 
Some employers very frankly state that they pre- 
fer to take a *' lumper" and make a mechanic of 
him rather than to spend their time with boys. 

Attitude of employee. 

In a number of industries which have been 
badly disintegrated, it is almost impossible under 
normal conditions for the apprentice to receive a 
regular course of instruction, for if the modern 



254 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

apprentice is to receive instruction at all in the 
shop, it mnst come principally from the foremen 
and journeymen. Few journeymen have any di- 
rect interest in the apprentice. They rather re- 
gard the apprentice as a rival who may eventually 
take the bread out of their mouths. The conse- 
quence is that the instruction of the apprentice 
is frequently neglected ; as a result a boy, instead 
of being trained as an all-around and efficient 
mechanic, is merely put to work at some simple 
occupation in which he readily becomes a proficient 
as well as a profitable employee. The apprentice 
thus tends to become a specialist. 

Attitude of hoy. 

It is unfortunate that boys ordinarily prefer 
the casual system of learning a trade rather than 
the definite method of apprenticeship. Various 
causes have combined to produce this effect, the 
most important of which are: First, the long 
and excessive term of apprenticeship with one 
employer and the low wages paid to apprentices, 
especially during the early period of their train- 
ing; second, the increasing age at which young 
people now begin their industrial career; and 
third, the possibility of acquiring some craft 
knowledge as a machine hand. These objections 
have been noted by the employers, and their trade 
associations have arranged in many instances a 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 255 

form of indenture that meets the questions of 
higher wages and length of the term of apprentice- 
ship which are raised by the boys. The danger 
of the methods adopted are referred to later in 
this chapter. 

A natural death. 

The decadence of the old apprenticeship system 
was not an unmixed evil. In no sense of the 
word would it meet the present industrial condi- 
tions. It may form a fine mental picture to look 
back at the boy indentured to a master craftsman 
binding himself for a term of seven years, living 
in his master's house, sitting at his master's table, 
attending his master's church, and starting out at 
the completion of his term of service on life's 
road with a new suit of clothes and a word of God- 
speed. The form of an early American indenture 
would to-day seem odd to us: *^The apprentice 
is to keep the master's secrets, do him no injury, 
not to frequent taverns, to commit indiscretions, 
nor commit excessive waste on his goods. He is 
not to betroth himself without his master's per- 
mission. He is not to wear certain garments, play 
at dice, checquers, or any other unlawful game. 
The master agrees to find him in all necessaries, 
food, clothing, bed, and so on, for seven years and 
to teach him the craft without any concealment." 

But there is another side to the picture. The 



256 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

boy was robbed of his time, for it would have been 
possible, through a more definite training, to have 
taught him the trade in much less time than the 
seven years nominated in the bond. Moreover, 
living in his master's house was not always a bed 
of roses, for many times he was expected to mind 
the baby and to sit up nights to watch the fires. 
To be sure, he had the opportunity of working 
under one master craftsman and eventually ab- 
sorbed all the skill and knowledge of his master. 
The master knew the whole of his trade and 
practised it every day. No one with a right 
understanding of present production, its spirit, 
purpose and methods, would advocate for a mo- 
ment a return to the old system of manufacturing ; 
yet no one can expect to renew the former methods 
without a return to the older industrialism. 

Perpetuation of skill. 

Many industrial establishments to-day, how- 
ever, are not blind to the need of training labor 
in their own works, notably, manufacturing firms 
in machine tool building, in jewelry and silver- 
smithing and in shipbuilding. In this direction, the 
National Metal Trades Association has been es- 
pecially active and has formally declared that ^*a 
proper apprenticeship system is essential to the 
education and perpetuation of skilled mechanics.'' 
Consequently, it has devised a form of indentured 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 257 

apprenticeship to meet the new order of produc- 
tion. These employers state that a modern form 
of indenture guarantees to the boy the opportunity 
to learn his trade as a whole ; a fixed wage and a 
steady increase; and more rapid advancement in 
trade training. To the employer it guarantees 
continuous service of the boy during a definite 
time; a better grade of boy, for an employer will 
not enter into a contract covering several years 
with a boy whom he does not select with care ; and 
more faithful service on the part of the boy, as he 
realizes that his interests are bound up with his 
employer's and that his advancement depends 
upon improving his opportunity. In a word, the 
employer wants a number of all-around workmen, 
not specialists alone, and he is willing to provide 
means for giving the necessary training, if he can 
be assured the boys will stay a definite time. On 
the other hand, bright and ambitious boys are will- 
ing to give the time necessary to learn a trade 
thoroughly, provided they can be assured that the 
opportunity will be given them. The new appren- 
ticeship indentures are supposed to guarantee to 
both parties a faithful performance of this mutual 
service. 

Good, had and indifferent. 

Unfortunately the guarantee does not always 
hold good, for one finds various kinds of appren- 



258 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

ticeship agreements and even more grades of ful- 
fillment by both parties to the agreement. Pres- 
ent systems range from those which merely 
indenture the boy for a term of years with a grad- 
ual increase of wages but without any definite sys- 
tem of shop training and no attempt on the part 
of the employer to keep the agreement with the 
boy that *^he shall be taught the art and mys- 
teries of the trade,'' to the system employed by 
some of the best industrial establishments where 
definite facilities are offered through ^^ schools in 
the factory" where the boy may learn a trade and 
where even his personal habits are watched. 

In assisting Carroll D. Wright in an investiga- 
tion of the apprenticeship system I had a given 
list of a number of concerns that were supposed 
to have a plan for training indentured appren- 
tices. Imagine my surprise when I discovered 
that more than half of these firms made absolutely 
no provision for carrying out their end of the 
agreement beyond providing work and paying 
wages. These employers were making no at- 
tempt to give systematic instruction in the **art'' 
of a trade, and as for its ** mystery,'' it was evi- 
dent this quality existed in the hide-and-seek 
game that the boy had to play in order to find 
any trade training at all. However, I must say 
that few of these boys seemed to object as long 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 259 

as they had the regular advance of wages agreed 
upon. 

In the machine trades, there were few concerns 
that had no system; the great majority had some 
system of indenture extending over a term of 
years; a small majority had a very elaborate 
scheme whereby they gave a trade training which 
could compare favorably with the best public in- 
dustrial training which could be offered. The 
building trades had a system of apprenticeship 
nearly as definite as of old, due in a large meas- 
ure to the nature of the trade, for building ma- 
terials are still placed by hand and the boys can 
be assigned to work under master craftsmen. 
Furthermore, there was an entire absence of any 
apprenticeship system in some industries. This 
is accounted for in the textile and shoe industries 
by the enormous advance in the use of machinery 
with a consequent subdivision of labor. In my 
own mind I divided these employers into three 
groups according to their several attitudes : first, 
a few employers that saw the importance of the 
problem of perpetuating skill and met it ; second, 
a larger number of employers who shut their eyes 
to the solution, if not to the problem itself; and 
third, employers engaged in those lines of produc- 
tion where an apprenticeship system is impracti- 
cable. 



260 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

It is noted that there may be two phases of the 
apprenticeship system, one a definite and com- 
plete system which may or may not be a substi- 
tute for public industrial training, depending 
upon the nature of the industry and the personal 
equation of the employer ; the other, an indefinite 
and incomplete system which does not fulfill the 
obligations essential to a properly conducted ap- 
prenticeship course — obligations which may be 
impossible to fulfill owing to the differentiation 
of labor or to the lack of willingness of employers 
to give definite instruction. 

A modern system. 

The General Electric Company at West Lynn, 
Massachusetts, has a system of apprenticeship 
which is worthy of study, not only because it is 
one of the best representatives of several recent 
attempts to maintain schools in the factory itself; 
but also because of the important bearing similar 
schemes may have on public industrial training. 
Its courses in machine shop practice, tool making, 
pattern making, and foundry work, are open to 
boys sixteen years of age who have had a grammar 
school education. Four years of apprenticeship 
service is required, with a trial period of two 
months. The apprentices are paid nine cents per 
hour the first year, twelve cents the second, four- 
teen cents the third year and sixteen and one-half 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 261 

cents the fourth year. A cash bonus of one hun- 
dred dollars is given at the completion of the 
course. Graduates of high schools, or those who 
have completed a three years' course in such 
schools, may have their apprenticeship period re- 
duced one year, beginning at nine cents an hour 
the first year, receiving fourteen cents the second 
year and sixteen and one-half cents the third year. 
Courses in bookwork are provided which are 
intended to give the apprentices a better under- 
standing of machines and machine parts through 
making them acquainted with scientific problems 
and calculations connected with reading mechan- 
ical drawings and designing auxiliary tools needed 
in modern manufacture. The school sessions are 
held during the working hours, and apprentices 
are paid the same wages which they would receive 
if they were working at the bench. The course of 
study comprises arithmetic, elementary algebra, 
mensuration, elementary trigonometry, elements 
of machines, power transmission, strength of ma- 
terials, mechanism, elementary electricity, mechan- 
ical drawing, machine design, and jig and fixture 
design. About one-fifth of the apprentices are at 
school at one time, and the services of one man 
are required to give them the academic instruction. 
The plan of paying the boys while receiving this 
education makes them feel the importance of it, 
as well as offers an inducement for those who 



262 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

might otherwise not be willing to obtain it at the 
sacrifice of wages. 

School in the factory. 

The schoolroom teacher just referred to is a man 
who has had engineering experience, with all the 
pedagogical qualities of a leader of boys. He is 
acquainted with the shop requirements, and knows 
how to adapt theoretical school training to the ed- 
ucational needs of the machine trades. The con- 
crete applications of science and mathematics are 
carefully selected from actual occurrences in the 
factory. This has the double advantage of initia- 
ting the apprentice into the technicalities of the 
business, making him acquainted with the various 
kinds of apparatus manufactured and the differ- 
ent materials used, and at the same time, familiar- 
izing him with the solution of the same sort of 
problems which he will later on meet as journey- 
man and foreman. Mechanical drawing is not 
taught for the purpose of developing draftsmen 
but as a means of teaching the designing of tools, 
jigs and fixtures needed for manufacturing on a 
large scale. The boys are taught to sketch out 
special tools, jigs and fixtures which may be re- 
quired from time to time for labor saving devices. 
The purpose is not to execute fine drawings, but 
rather to have the boy acquire the habit of sketch- 
ing quickly for immediate use in tool making. Ex- 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 263 

aminations in school work are held frequently 
during the year, and a final examination at the 
end of the course determines, to some extent, the 
standing of the apprentice and the wages which 
the company considers commensurate with his 
value as a journeyman. 

Apprentice vs, foreman. 

Ordinarily, as has been pointed out, there is a 
natural conflict in the shops between the purpose 
of the apprentice and the foreman. The boy 
comes for shop training and he wants to procure 
all possible information in the shortest time and 
desires a variety of work in one department and 
an opportunity to work in all departments. On 
the other hand, the foreman, representing the 
company, strives for economy, for cheapness of 
production, and he can better further his ends 
by keeping the apprentice on one class of work 
and in one department for a long time. Few fore- 
men combine a legitimate care of their own inter- 
ests with a proper appreciation of the boy's ob- 
jective. There is a tendency at first for the av- 
erage foreman to utilize the apprentice in run- 
ning errands. Later he will give him simple 
work at a bench, such as chiseling and plain filing, 
or the cleaning of small castings or possibly assist- 
ing the stock keeper in giving out small tools and 
materials ; but he holds off from giving him defi- 



264 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

nite instruction in the trade itself. Obviously, 
there is a certain value in this method, for it fa- 
miliarizes a boy with factory life and system, ac- 
customs him to its atmosphere and gives him an 
elementary knowledge of his trade, but after a 
while any further expenditure of time gradually 
becomes more and more disproportionate to ad- 
ditional advantage gained. Bright, ambitious 
boys realize when this point is reached, and begin 
to press the foreman for a higher grade of work, 
especially for the opportunity to work at some 
machine. The apprentice pushes himself into the 
foreground in order that he may learn different 
classes of work, but the foreman is usually slow 
to respond to his appeal. The boy is between 
two millstones, for if he is inefficient at some par- 
ticular work, he should be held at that work for 
improvement, and on the other hand, if he is 
efficient, the foreman is likely to keep him for an 
undue length of time in order to get the greatest 
commercial advantage out of the boy's work. 

Remedying the evil. 

The General Electric Company in the scheme 
outlined in a preceding paragraph has attempted 
to avoid this sort of exploitation of boys and to 
equalize the opportunities for all apprentices by 
affording them during the first part of their 
course, expert instruction in the practical work of 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 265 

the trade, through, the ^'apprentice training 
room/' which simply means that a portion of the 
factory equipment has been set aside for the 
special use of apprentices. Here the boys 
are instructed in shop practice by a mas- 
ter mechanic who possesses ability and patience. 
During the trial period he studies their moral 
and mental makeup and their native ability to 
learn a chosen trade. Through such a training 
room the best and most efficient methods of shop 
production can be instilled in them, as they are 
apart from other workmen who may express hos- 
tility towards them by hampering their work or 
by refusing to teach the fine points of the trade. 
One instance will serve to illustrate this point. A 
few years ago a high speed cutting steel was intro- 
duced in the works. It made possible a greater 
amount of production within a given time. The 
older workmen, imbued with the traditional per- 
formance of former cutting tools, did not take 
kindly to the new methods and naturally would 
make no attempt to increase the cutting speed. If 
beginners had been working near them the latter 
would have caught the same spirit, but by sepa- 
rating the two, the company was able to bring up 
the boys to the latest methods. In addition the 
apprentices act as assistant instructors and teach 
other boys. The company considers that there 
is educational value in having an apprentice, who 



266 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

has thoroughly learned a certain operation, im- 
part that knowledge to a new apprentice before he 
is taught another operation. In this way appren- 
tices are pupils to-day and teachers to-morrow. 
This develops in the apprentice the faculty to 
instruct, and brings out the best efforts of the in- 
dividual and prepares the boy for the duties of 
foreman. At the same time it saves the com- 
pany the cost of extra instructors. The latter 
is probably the real reason for this innovation. 
All production of the training room is of com- 
mercial value. The psychological value of com- 
mercial work is of great importance. It takes a 
boy out of the sphere of theory and into that of 
practice. It clinches his interest by making him 
realize that the product of his work is to be a part 
of some useful machine. Again, the company has 
its eye on the main chance, and fortunately it is 
able to combine business sagacity with sound 
pedagogy. 

The result. 

After the students have spent from one and 
one-half to two and one-half years in the train- 
ing room they are transferred to regular depart- 
ments of the works where they finish the remain- 
der of their apprenticeship. Here they have an 
opportunity to specialize in die making, tool mak- 
ing, or laying out of machine work. They are 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 267 

placed -under the direct charge and discipline of 
the respective shop foremen. 

The number who remain in the service of the 
company is fairly satisfactory. Naturally, the 
company encourages this procedure. The temp- 
tation of the graduate apprentice, with $100 in 
his pocket, to see something of the world is very 
great but a considerable number of those who 
leave, after seeking employment elsewhere, return 
as journeymen. 

'Another phase. 

A development of the same idea and one which 
promises to be most important in railroad cir- 
cles, is the apprenticeship system introduced 
upon the New York Central lines. For years the 
railroads have been taking graduates of engineer- 
ing colleges and bringing them up to the business 
of railroad management. But a general feeling 
has been growing that railroads must do more 
than train college graduates for positions of re- 
sponsibility. In the words of Mr. George M. 
Basford, of the American Locomotive Company: 
^'It is well to provide for the college man by 
taking him into the shop. It is, however, a mis- 
take more serious than most of us now realize, to 
provide for them unless we have previously put 
our shop recruiting system for the workmen — 
the men who do our work — upon a proper basis. 



268 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

From every standpoint, the college graduate 
apprenticeship is wrong unless based npon, and 
preceded by a proper recruiting system. If we 
have a proper regular apprenticeship system for 
the workers, we have a moral right to deal with 
college graduate apprenticeship. If we have not 
such a system, we have no such right, and we are 
making an error for which we shall in time pay 
dearly. A warning is evidently needed lest we 
build our pyramid upon its apex. While we stand 
in need of captains and a few subordinate officers, 
we stand in greater need of an intelligent rank 
and file. In developing the first class, let us not 
kill the second. It is from the rank and file that 
we always have developed leaders, and always 
will. We shall suffer in the long run by any 
policy which tends in any way to discourage am- 
bition in the large class of men upon whom we 
must rely. The best we can do for an industrial 
organization, and for everyone who enters it, is 
to put recruits upon an actual, rather than an ar- 
tificial footing, allowing everyone to make his 
place in the organization in competition with 
everybody else. ' ' 

This is a sound doctrine fittingly spoken and 
should have been heeded long ago by all employ- 
ers of labor. Mr. Basford brought forward a 
plan of training the rank and file at a meeting of 
the Master Mechanics Association of American 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 269 

Eailways, and soon after, the New York Central 
inaugurated its system of shop training for 
young apprentices. As a result there have been 
established schools at ten points on this and the 
affiliated lines. 

These schools provide for the close super- 
vision and instruction of the apprentices in the 
shop by an apprentice instructor. They are con- 
ducted by the company during working hours, 
the apprentice being paid for attendance. Me- 
chanical drawing is taught in a practical way. 
A course of problems has been prepared and care- 
fully arranged to suit the needs of the appren- 
tices, and the pupils are expected to work them 
out during their own time. 

The method of teaching differs from the ordi- 
nary in the following points: text-books are not 
an essential part of the plan; there is no subdi- 
vision into subjects; all principles are clothed in 
problem form; there is no arbitrary standard of 
the amount of ground to be covered and no exam- 
inations are held. The progress of the appren- 
tice depends upon the close personal touch main- 
tained between him and the instructor. He is 
under the foreman, as heretofore, but the fore- 
man is relieved of the technical instruction of the 
apprentice. The classes meet twice a week for 
the first two hours in the morning, when the boys 
are bright and fresh and, able to do their best 



270 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

work. The average number in a class is seven- 
teen. The total number of apprentices in the ten 
schools thus far established is about five hundred. 
Moreover, shop schedules for apprentices are fol- 
lowed, thus insuring a thorough training in the 
trade and giving the necessary amount of va- 
riety. This is an essential point for there must 
be shop progress as well as definite and progres- 
sive bookwork. The drawing and problem 
courses are arranged to allow each apprentice to 
proceed as rapidly as he desires. The manage- 
ment reports that the apprentices, as a rule, ap- 
preciate the privileges thus accorded them, and 
states that the company secures a better class of 
boys for apprenticeship ; apprentices, because they 
understand the shop directions, perform their du- 
ties with greater efficiency; there is an increased 
output, with less spoiled work on the part of be- 
ginners. 

Well defined advantages. 

Advocates of public industrial training can 
learn a good deal by studying the methods of 
instruction used in a first-class factory school, 
for there are certain well defined advantages of a 
proper system of apprenticeship over public 
trade schools. At least, the apprenticeship sys- 
tem may be a mighty competitor if properly 
handled. But so few shops have any adequate 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 271 

scheme of instruction that it will be a long time 
before any clash of opinions of the relative merits 
need occur, and the chapter on trade schools 
makes clear the advantage of public trade train- 
ing over the average so-called apprenticeship 
system. For the sake of argument we will sup- 
pose that every apprenticeship system offers pro- 
gressive instruction in shop practice and its 
related bookwork. Let us look into the advan- 
tages of such a method of training over public 
trade schools. 

First, it assures the boy a practical training 
in actual shop processes and methods and thus 
gives him a good start at the completion of the 
term of apprenticeship. The employer knows the 
apprentice even before his time has expired and 
may have his eye on him for promotion. The ap- 
prentice being familiar with the special conditions 
pertaining to the particular shop, is ready to step 
right into his job. 

Second, the apprenticeship system gives the 
boy a chance to earn as well as learn. This 
point has been brought out in the description of 
the cooperative system and it has an important 
bearing on the whole question of trade schools, 
for the class of boys to which industrial educa- 
tion appeals is usually made up of those who 
cannot afford to spend four years in a trade 
school. Moreover, if the trade schools over-em- 



272 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

phasize academic work they will not stay. At the 
same time no apprenticeship system, good or 
bad, with which I am familiar, ever makes the last 
mentioned mistake, for the employer makes his 
profit not on the bookwork but on the amount of 
shopwork the boy does. Undoubtedly it is ex- 
tremely difficult to hold the boy in a trade school. 
The call of the almighty dollar appeals to him 
as it does to his elders. Even the one year course 
in the North End Union Printing School in Bos- 
ton has difficulty in holding the boys for they 
prefer to go directly into the printing office where 
they are paid for their time. 

Third, it makes the boy feel that he is doing 
something worth while since he is a part of a 
great industrial game where he is making things 
to sell. The pile of castings becomes the rows of 
finished machines and he has had his share in 
the output. 

Fourth, it appeals to the parents as being very 
practical, not merely because the boy is self-sup- 
porting, but also because the father learned his 
trade in the shop and cannot see how it can be 
learned in any other way. Fathers say to their 
boys, ^ ^ If you really want to learn a trade you 
must come with me into the shop. That was the 
way I got mine, and what was good enough for 
me is best for you." 

Fifth, the system of apprenticing boys appeals 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 273 

to the employer, for lie can train boys in pro- 
cesses and methods peculiar to his industry, to 
say nothing about personal idiosyncrasies. More- 
over, the employer can afford to teach the green 
boy, as he can make a profit on him at the begin- 
ning, while a trade school graduate would want all 
he was worth, at the start, and perhaps more too. 
We all know that employers make a profit on their 
apprentices when they have a well thought out sys- 
tem of training. Some confess it; others show 
it by their action during dull seasons when they 
discharge experienced workmen but still retain 
their apprentices. E. P. Bullard, a manufacturer 
of Bridgeport, Connecticut, with years of experi- 
ence with apprentices, was asked whether appren- 
ticeship systems pay the employer? His reply 
was ''Most emphatically, yes. Many successful 
concerns who have had apprenticeship systems in 
operation for a period of years are unanimous in 
their statements that apprenticeship systems do 
pay. If properly instructed and intelligentlj" 
directed, the employment of apprentices is more 
profitable than the employment of the so-called 
skilled workman who has been available in the 
past. Apprentices pay as producers during their 
term of service ; as skilled journeymen when they 
have completed their course; and as intelligent 
foremen and executives later.'' 

Sixth, it appeals to other workingmen, for it 



274 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

starts tlie boy at the bottom round of the indus- 
trial ladder and through a natural process of the 
survival of the fittest, eliminates the undesirable 
element. Especially is this true if the trade 
school gives its graduates an impression that 
they are predestined to be foremen, for that is 
bound to cause hard feelings on the part of shop- 
trained workmen. It is of tremendous social and 
industrial importance that our leaders should 
rise from the ranks if we are to get the best re- 
sults from the mass of industrial workers. If 
the apprentice, whether he be a graduate of a 
trade school or attends a factory school, can ad- 
vance through deserved promotions to a position 
of responsibility, the personal contact which he 
will have with the rank and file will leaven the 
entire mass. It is common knowledge that fore- 
men and superintendents who have risen from 
apprentices, get along better with those under 
them for the simple reason that they appreciate 
the point of view of the other fellow. 

Facing the truth. 

Not all apprenticeship systems are conducted 
in such a broad and comprehensive manner as 
the two which have been outlined. As has al- 
ready been implied, some apprenticeship agree- 
ments pretend to teach a trade, but make no defi- 
nite provision for carrying it out. John Mitchell 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 275 

states it fairly: *^ While in certain trades un- 
modified by the advent of machinery, apprentice- 
ship may still persist in its oldtime form, in most 
cases the system of indenturing boys for a long 
period must be definitely surrendered. The boys 
themselves are no longer willing to serve this pro- 
tracted apprenticeship, and, as a general rule, no 
opportunity is afforded in the great industrial 
establishments of to-day for a youth to acquire a 
thorough knowledge of the trade even when such 
a knowledge would be necessary or advantageous 
to him.'' Some of the objectionable features of 
many of the so-called apprenticeship systems have 
already been touched upon, but they ought to be 
collected at this place for the purpose of compari- 
son with the definite and genuine appenticeship 
systems. They may be summed up as follows : 

First, beginners are hired by the employment 
department without any special care as to their 
selection. This is especially true of large plants. 
They are then assigned to shop foremen who 
utilize them as errand boys and expect them to 
sweep floors and pile castings. This is done to 
try them out, but in reality it does nothing more 
than test their ability to hold their job. Of 
course, neatness, promptness and politeness are 
factors, but all these qualities could just as well 
be tried out by assignment to definite or ma- 
chine work, or to the toot or stock room. While 



276 THE AVORKER AND THE STATE 

moral qualities have their value, they do not nec- 
essarily mean that the boy has any mechanical 
ability. 

Second, the ideals of the foreman and the ap- 
prentice are at cross purposes. The apprentice 
desires to learn a trade. The foreman wants to 
cheapen the cost of production; consequently, 
there is a tendency to exploit the boy. Often the 
apprentice is placed under the direct charge of 
a journeyman who is on piece work and the boy 
merely acts as a helper. In some shops the work- 
men make it a practice of standing in with the 
foreman in order to secure the services of boys 
to aid them in running some automatic machine, 
the journeyman taking the contract for a given 
line of work and paying out of his own pocket 
the wages of his young helper. 

Third, once in awhile an apprentice will be 
assigned to a department where there are a few 
narrow minded workmen, who will not show him 
anything. Fortunately, this is not a common oc- 
currence, for most journeymen, if they have 
the time and patience, will stop to help the boy. 
I have often been struck by the good feeling be- 
tween the two, and when there is a lack of cor- 
diality it is usually because the employer is try- 
ing to supplant journeymen by employing too 
many boys. Of course, some of the older men 
who have served a long apprenticeship say, **Let 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 277 

the kid pick it up as I did." I remember one 
shop in a New England city, where I saw the 
apprentice standing idly by during an intricate 
machine operation. I asked the workman why 
he did not tell the young apprentice what the 
process was all about and he replied, ^^What do 
you think I am — a teacher ! ^ ' 

Fourth, the majority of apprenticeship courses 
do not provide for bookwork, which should be a 
supplementary part of every boy's trade train- 
ing. A trade cannot be properly learned unless 
he knows the mathematics, mechanics and busi- 
ness methods which go with it. This instruction 
may be given in the company's works or out- 
side, but in both cases, must be definite and pro- 
gressive. The regular trade school will always 
be a successful competitor unless the apprentice- 
ship system provides some sort of definite aca- 
demic work. 

Trade unions and apprenticeship. 

The trade unions have sometimes been charged 
by their opponents with the failure of the appren- 
ticeship system. Statistical information goes to 
show that this is true in but a few trades, and 
that trade union restriction of apprentices is but 
a slight factor in this problem. John Mitchell 
declares : '^ As a matter of fact, it is usually found 
that in the cases in which American trade 



278 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

unions actually determine the number of ap- 
prentices, the employers in the trade are unwill- 
ing to take on as many apprentices as the union 
permits.^' One personal experience will illus- 
trate this point. Several years ago I dropped 
into the office of a manufacturer to inquire about 
the apprenticeship system. Immediately he 
commenced to berate the union regulations, stat- 
ing that he could not employ all the apprentices 
he needed. I found that by the union rules he 
was entitled to one operative for every eight 
journeymen in his employ. He had eighty-two 
men on his payroll. This would provide for ten 
apprentices. He actually had but four in the 
works. 

A development occasioning apprehension. 

There is a form of special apprenticeship 
gradually creeping into the machine trades that 
is liable to deceive those who look upon all ap- 
prenticeship systems as being alike. This sys- 
tem assumes that if the great majority of work- 
men are to be specialists, then the apprenticeship 
course should take cognizance of this fact and 
should train men for the work they are to do. 
Advocates of this system say that it is a condi- 
tion, and not a theory, which confronts them. 
They state that it is difficult to obtain boys for 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 279 

the general shop training courses for the rate of 
wage which can be offered, because when boys 
are transferred from one department to another, 
there is a loss of efficiency for the time being, so 
far as output is concerned. They state, more- 
over, that these departments are so large in them- 
selves and have so many operations and proc- 
esses, that they can easily employ nearly all the 
capacity of the boy for the full term of indenture. 
Under the special apprenticeship plan the boy 
attains a good r^te of efficiency in a compara- 
tively short time, so that departmental instruction 
is reflected in an immediately increased efficiency, 
and the plan is furthered because it is found to 
be immediately profitable. There is a short trial 
period, and then indenture in one of the eleven 
departments of turning, vertical boring mill, hor- 
izontal boring mill, planing, milling, drilling, 
grinding, erecting, turret, vise, scraping. For 
example, in the planing course the agreement 
reads that the apprentice is to spend one and one- 
half years, of two thousand nine hundred hours 
a year, in this department, being paid twelve 
cents an hour the first six months, fourteen cents 
the second six months, and sixteen cents the third 
six months. Eegular apprenticeship system 
course may be taken afterwards if boy elects it. 



280 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

'A discouraging note. 

That not all firms find the path of apprentice- 
ship training easy is evident from the following 
letter by a well known machine tool builder, who 
describes the difficulties of training apprentices 
under present conditions in many American 
works. He says, *'We do not have any appren- 
tices in our works, having discontinued this 
branch of our help some two or three years ago, 
for the following reasons: first, our experience 
has been that there are only about forty per cent 
of our boys that ever completed their course, the 
majority leaving at about the beginning, or dur- 
ing the second year, the principal reason being 
the inducements offered by other shops, many of 
them paying full wages to apprentices who had 
worked this length of time in our works. Second, 
our term of apprenticeship was four years, and 
in order to satisfy these boys we found that it 
was necessary to change them about at least once 
in six months. In actual practice we found that 
we were running a kindergarten, for no sooner 
had they become sufficiently accurate and prac- 
tical to turn out work on the machine which they 
were operating, and oftentimes before they were 
competent, they were dissatisfied if not trans- 
ferred to another machine of the same type or one 
of different type. Third, we find that in our 
business it is much more practical to secure the 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 281 

services of intelligent laboring men from twenty 
to thirty-five years of age. They enter our serv- 
ice on a three-year contract. The first year we 
pay them practically what they would be able to 
earn at common labor, advancing them each year 
until their term is completed. Their contracts 
call for continual service on one line of machines 
or work; that is, if a man is started in at lathe 
work, he is advanced from one class of lathe work 
to another as rapidly as his ability will permit; 
the same is true with regard to planer work. 
With this system we are able to keep our ma- 
chines in constant operation and usually we get 
practical, reliable help. In machine tool build- 
ing much greater accuracy is required than in the 
ordinary lines of mechanical work and the aver- 
age apprentice does not attain sufficient accuracy 
and experience, nor has he ability to turn out 
work in paying quantities, when his experience 
is limited to six months, or when he is changed 
from one machine or class of work to another; 
consequently, he cannot turn out enough work in 
paying quantities for us to permit him to use a 
high-priced machine on which to get his ex- 
perience.'' 

The hearing upon industrial education. 

From all that has been said, it is evident that 
some industries have great possibilities in their 



282 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

own works for giving the proper industrial train- 
ing to employees, while other industries must 
look to public industrial and trade training to 
meet their needs for skilled and intelligent 
workers. It is well to bear in mind that industrial 
education must be adjusted to the varied require- 
ments of such industries, and in some instances, 
must actually supply the demand for skilled work- 
men as far as any public school system can sup- 
ply it. In other cases it may supplement the 
training in a school with the training in the shop, 
or it may have as its sole function the right sort 
of preparation for the practical and efficient train- 
ing received in an excellent apprenticeship sys- 
tem. In the first instance, it means public trade 
schools; in the second, cooperative or continu- 
ation schools, both day and evening; and in the 
third, preparatory industrial training up to the 
age of sixteen. 

From fourteen to sixteen. 

In those communities where a first class ap- 
prenticeship system exists, the value of establish- 
ing a local trade school for the boy of sixteen 
may be questioned. But there is no doubt of the 
value of general industrial training as a definite 
preparation for the special shop apprentice train- 
ing which has been described. Boys who are go- 
ing to enter the shops must be kept in school until 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 283 

they are sixteen. The unwillingness of manufac- 
turers to employ a boy until he is sixteen or 
seventeen and has reached the age of discretion 
as well as of more physical maturity, makes it 
imperative that public education provide facil- 
ities for meeting this condition. The recent de- 
velopment of the special apprenticeship system 
in the machine tool builders trade only empha- 
sizes the need for general industrial training. 
The tendency of modern industry is towards 
specialization. There is no getting away from 
the fact. The rapid increase in the number of 
divisions of the various industries into related in- 
dustries, the ever-increasing subdivision of proc- 
esses and operations within a single department 
of the industry, means that no worker can master 
the whole of an industry unless extraordinary 
effort is made either by trade school or manu- 
facturers to counteract through sound vocational 
training the prevailing tendency. 

The action of the National Tool Builders' As- 
sociation in boldly stating that they expect to 
train specialists, will do much in calling the at- 
tention of the public to the necessity for broad 
industrial training before the age of seventeen. 
If the shop tendency of training specialists is 
likely to continue — and there is no reason to 
think that it will be different — it means that the 
boy must receive some all-around academic and 



284 THE WOEKER AND THE STATE 

hand training before lie enters the industry, else 
it will be impossible for him to rise above the 
conditions imposed by the industrial organization. 
It is the common experience that few boys who 
enter upon a sjDecial apprenticeship system ever 
take up the full apprenticeship course afterward. 
The pay at the end of the special apprenticeship 
service is too large in proportion to that which 
he would receive if he started over again in an- 
other department, to make it a sufficient induce- 
ment for him to continue a scheme of training 
which will make him a master of the details of 
all the branches of his trade. 

The lesson to learn. 

The lesson to be drawn from a study of the ap- 
prenticeship system is perfectly clear. If the 
more progressive manufacturers are ready to 
provide trade teaching in their own factories after 
the boy is sixteen, then the public school must 
provide the right sort of industrial training be- 
fore he reaches that age. These men say that 
the majority of the applicants for the appren- 
ticeship course have left school as soon as the 
law allowed, and that they have been in all sorts 
of work, that ihej have not improved mentally 
or morally and have forgotten many of the pre- 
cepts taught in school. Again and again they 
have stated that they would like to have boys 



SCHOOLS IN THE FACTORY 285 

better prepared in general intelligence and in 
hand training, with, a better mental grasp of in- 
dustrialism, a better understanding of practical 
mathematics and simple mechanical drawing. 

The excellent methods of teaching in the fac- 
tory schools the shop problems relating to the for- 
mal subjects of arithmetic, algebra, geometry, 
mechanics and chemistry, ought to have a great 
influence on the methods of instruction in the pub- 
lic industrial schools. It is a revelation to see 
the manner of approach of the applications of 
theory to practice; each example being a con- 
crete illustration of some mechanical principle 
of the daily shop practice. Public school teachers 
well might study the methods of instruction 
adopted by the instructors of the New York Cen- 
tral Lines. Instead of working from theory to 
practice, the pupils work from practice to theory. 
They take an old steam pump, run it by com- 
pressed air in the school-room, and let the appren- 
tices see the way it works, take it apart and ex- 
amine into the valve motion, make drawings of 
the various parts, calculate the cubical contents 
of the cylinders, study the various mechanisms, 
and then go out into the shop and grind the 
valves. In short, starting with the pump, they 
work out by concrete applications the subjects 
of arithmetic, geometry, mechanical drawing and 
mechanics. 



286 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

It must not be assumed that a trade or indus- 
trial school is the only agency by which an in- 
creased amount of skill can be secured. In the 
opinion of all educators who have given the mat- 
ter any thought, the apprenticeship system, in its 
modern form, must be reckoned with as a pow- 
erful element. The aims and purposes of all 
methods, whether they be worked out in a trade 
school, industrial school, or apprenticeship sys- 
tem, are the same, each to be applied and de- 
veloped in accordance with the conditions of 
local communities and their industries. The 
broad minded individual must reckon with all 
these expressions of industrial training. Nar- 
rowness of vision, personal jealousy, and special 
advocacy of one system or another will be prejudi- 
cial to furthering a sane solution of the problem 
of education of industrial workers. 



- IX 

SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION IN ITS RELA- 
TION TO INDUSTRY 

IN an ideal state there would be no distinct 
line of cleavage between periods of formal 
education and wage-earning work. Our young 
men and women should be workers, and yet al- 
ways students with enough time to spare from 
both for recreation and full enjoyment of life. 
While it may be visionary to hope that some day 
there will be this close connection between school 
and life, everyone must regret at least that the 
majority of our people look upon education as 
a schooling occupying the first few years of 
life, during which they do little or no work, and 
this schooling over, are ready to enter the in- 
dustrial world with few if any opportunities for 
further study, save those which the exceptionally 
ambitious man or woman will create for himself. 

Educational field. 

What are the ways of supplementing school 
education open to the youth who has left school 

287 



288 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

as soon as he passed the age of compulsory at- 
tendance? To define clearly the nature of sup- 
plemental education, the three main divisions of 
the whole field of education may be indicated as 
follows : 

First, fundamental education, or that which 
gives a general training for life's work. Under 
this head would come the so-called common 
schools, academies and colleges — all schools whose 
work is conducted for the student class. 

Second, incidental education, or that acquired 
when the student or worker meets conditions 
which differ from those of the school-room, an 
experience gained as he solves the problems and 
performs the duties of daily life. While the 
education of experience has its disciplinary value, 
it is not the ideal means to come by a trade or 
profession. 

Third, supplemental education, that which 
makes up deficiencies in one's schooling, or fur- 
nishes the necessary complement to one's inci- 
dental education. It is neither an imitation nor 
a substitute for fundamental or incidental edu- 
cation. It supplies something which the youth 
has failed to get in regular school work, and is 
failing to get in active life. Supplemental are 
those institutions other than day schools, which 
serve primarily those who do not belong to the 
student class. 



SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION 289 

Agencies of supplemental education. 

Among the most fruitful agencies of supple- 
mental education are reading rooms and libra- 
ries, especially those which suggest and direct 
courses of reading. Several evening institutes 
in this country, carrying on highly developed 
industrial work, of which Mechanics Institute 
in New York is a notable example, are the out- 
come of workingmen's institutes originally char- 
tered to provide the self-improvement of their 
members through technical libraries. Public li- 
braries are endeavoring through special lists of 
technical journals and books, to reach the indus- 
trial workers. Springfield, Massachusetts, and 
Newark, New Jersey, are very successful in their 
library extension work, selecting and arranging 
these books so as to make them accessible and 
helpful in connection with the daily life and work 
of the mechanic. 

A noteworthy indication of a widespread desire 
for supplemental instruction is the remarkable 
growth of correspondence schools in the last dec- 
ade. Over one and a quarter million students 
have been enrolled in one school alone. The 
great majority of these are employed in the in- 
dustries. Courses are offered in every conceiv- 
able subject, and reach every point where the 
mail is delivered. However, according to the 
data furnished by the manager of one of the larg- 



290 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

est schools, only 2.6 per cent of the enrolled stu- 
dents ever complete an entire course. This fact 
must not be used against this school or the work it 
is doing, as many of its members subscribe to its 
courses with no intention of completing the course, 
retaining the books for future reference after 
having received the necessary help in some one 
branch of instruction. 

The following reasons why students do not 
complete their courses are given by the promoters 
of these schools. They enroll for the purpose of 
studying certain operations and do not care to 
complete a course, provided they are able to pass 
some civil service examination. Some buy the 
books without intending to hand in papers, while 
others do not possess sufficient grit and determi- 
nation to persist, especially when they receive no 
special encouragement. Some are obliged to 
stop studying on account of being forced to work 
long hours. A number who enroll think they can 
study and find they cannot, or else they are igno- 
rant of the way to start in on the subject. A 
few enroll because their friends are enrolled 
and because it is the proper thing to do. Others 
do well during the winter and early spring but 
lay aside their enthusiasm when the warm 
weather comes. There is no way of compelling 
the students to study, for the school cannot 
threaten them with suspension or expulsion. 



SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION 291 

Much has been said for and against these 
schools. Two facts are worthy of attention. 
First, hundreds of past students testify to the 
value of the instruction that they have received. 
Many employers also speak of its advantages to 
them, personally. Second, with practical, up-to- 
date teaching in our evening schools, there can 
be no question of the advantage of classroom 
instruction over correspondence instruction. 
The inspiration of the teacher, and contact with 
fellow students give a motive force beyond that 
imparted by an impersonal teacher commenting 
on a letter of inquiry or sending out a typewrit- 
ten lesson to be mastered by detached and irreg- 
ular students and projecting encouragement, in- 
struction and counsel by long distance communi- 
cations. 

Other powerful factors in supplemental work 
are the educational classes of the Young Men's 
Christian Association, Young Women's Chris- 
tian Association, city evening schools. People's 
Institutes, Chautauqua courses, University Ex- 
tension lectures, vacation schools, etc. In these 
an effort is made to meet the members' current 
needs and interests by giving technical instruction 
to those who wish to advance in their present 
occupations or to fit themselves for higher posi- 
tions, and by giving cultural courses to those who 
wish to broaden their outlook. 



292 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

Supplemental education has tlius a large and 
important field, and touches life on all sides. It 
often awakens a sense of intellectual need and is 
the beginning of an appreciation of culture. Our 
evening high schools are doing good work along 
this line, particularly in offering courses in his- 
tory, English, the sciences and languages. They 
enable one to investigate his special interests, 
discover his natural bent, and measure his capac- 
ities. Likewise the evening vocational courses, 
both industrial and commercial, are aiding young 
men and women in this respect. 

Making up deficiencies. 

Supplemental education provides facilities for 
making up deficiencies in one's elementary educa- 
tion. The elementary evening school work has 
always fulfilled its greatest mission with this class 
of students. 

In many cities the evening schools have re- 
cently been filled with the foreign born who have 
had to master our language. Adults have been 
grouped with minors in classes in reading, writ- 
ing and arithmetic, to the detriment of the work. 
I have been chagrined at the lack of proper per- 
spective on the part of teachers when I have vis- 
ited evening schools where mature foreigners 
have been forced to learn the English language 
from primers adapted to small children. It is 



SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION 293 

pathetic to see grown men reading such sentences 
as ^'I see the cat;'' ''Can the dog catch the catT' 
and such other dribble. Why not a book which 
treats in an elementary manner of the civic and 
industrial duties of our future citizens? For 
illustration, ''I see the city hall; it is the seat 
of our local government;'' ''I must buy flour at 
the store," etc. Every effort should be made to 
reduce the embarrassment which many of the 
adults feel at having to be instructed after pass- 
ing the usual school age by separating the adults 
from the younger members of the class. Because 
of the extreme self -consciousness of the mature 
non-student class when endeavoring to make up 
their deficiencies or working on unusual lines of 
effort, there arises the necessity for careful shap- 
ing of administrative plans in advertising, re- 
ports and current conduct of the work to avoid 
making any attendant conspicuous as a delin- 
quent or as a belated or emergency student. It 
is a fact that most of our evening school work 
has never gone beyond carrying out the require- 
ments of state laws relating to compulsory even- 
ing attendance for those who cannot read and 
write. 

Personal advancement. 

Often its special appeal is in offering to fit for 
improved service or advancement in the line of 



294 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

one's present employment. This is the great 
field for vocational work in the evening school 
and the subject will be amplified later in this 
chapter. Again, through the educational occu- 
pation of his leisure hours, it aids one who is un- 
fortunately placed to gain successful entrance 
into an activity for which he is better adapted. 
Except through supplemental study there is no 
way for many young men and women to fit them- 
selves to occupy a higher round on the economic 
ladder. It is a pity to see so many men and 
women doing service which offers no opportunity 
for advancement. A telegraph, messenger or 
elevator boy can live on a boy's pay, but a self- 
supporting man requires a man's pay and should 
be doing a man's work. The community should 
see that he does it by fitting him to do it. 

Principles to he established. 

According to Walter M. Wood, director of edu- 
cational activities in the Chicago Young Men's 
Christian Association, there are certain fundamen- 
tal principles to be followed in the conduct of even- 
ing school work. Some are enumerated here. In 
so far as they apply to industrial activities, they 
will be given special treatment later. 

First, it must deal with two rather distinct 
classes: (a) students proper, constituting the 
small minority who seek a general education, 



SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION 295 

with definite student purpose, but often under 
rather unusual personal conditions; (b) non- 
student class, constituting the large majority, 
who, by suggestion or counsel, seek educational 
help in the solution of some present problem or in 
fitting for some special service. 

Second, the scheme of work offered must make 
the various features elective to a maximum de- 
gree. While the ideas of the school men can and 
must prevail in the day schools, the individual 
notions of a mature student will dominate his 
selection of subjects in the evening schools. 

Third, the work must be flexible enough in its 
adaptation to meet individual, special and even 
transient needs and conditions. 

Fourth, the subjects must be presented in small 
and varied units. 

Fifth, the various units of work must be so 
scheduled that sequential arrangement in courses 
is possible when desired. It should be even en- 
couraged. 

Sixth, all forms of work must glow with the 
recreative element, both in subject-matter and 
treatment. 

Seventh, the work must, in many of its rudi- 
mentary forms, aim at suggestion and inspira- 
tion, rather than complete or thorough training. 

Eighth, the work must seek to increase the 
student's capacity to live^ efficiently and largely, 



296 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

rather than to promote the accumulation of knowl- 
edge or the development of scholastic ability. 

Ninth, much stress must be laid on the teach- 
ing itself. By suggestion and personal cooper- 
ation, the teacher can awaken and develop to a 
wonderful degree, a mind rendered mentally in- 
active by disassociation with educational forces. 

Tenth, the work must have its own distinct 
ideals, methods and estimates of value, based upon 
the current conditions and individual needs of the 
non-student class rather than on regular school 
standards which are primarily applicable to the 
student class. 

On an independent basis. 

As a practical expedient in the promotion of 
evening elementary and high schools, and the more 
recent supplemental movements such as evening 
vocational schools, it is usually wise in matters of 
administration to keep the two separate and dis- 
tinct. This provides against the necessarily ir- 
regular, special and frequently uncredited work 
of the supplemental movement discounting or 
handicapping the conduct of the necessarily sys- 
tematic, aggressive and credited work of the older 
educational institutions. On the other hand, it 
protects the vocational school from being re- 
stricted in its liberty of adaptation or converted 
into a mere auxiliary feeder to some school. 



SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION 297 

Association with daily life. 

Its methods of administration must be adapted 
to meet the peculiar conditions and personal atti- 
tudes of those to be served. The desirable loca- 
tions for such work are in the natural assembling 
places of working people, especially during their 
leisure hours, to as great a degree as possible 
making the educational effort in which they par- 
ticipate a natural adjunct to their everyday life, 
instead of a separate and distinct enterprise. 
This consideration has been the cause of placing 
libraries, reading rooms, lectures and class work 
in stores and factories, instead of congesting all 
these features in distinct places set apart in the 
community as strictly educational centers. It 
may surprise some to learn that the most suc- 
cessful educational work for foreigners has been 
given in the halls commonly used by these people 
for dancing purposes. Evening schools for 
working people must be near their homes, or near 
the factories and stores in which they work. In 
some cities one will find evening schools in fac- 
tories in rooms set apart for the purpose. The 
Drop Forging Company, Utica, New York, has 
established an educational center in its works. 
Some department stores in Chicago, New York 
and Boston carry on educational work in the 
early hours of the working day before the bar- 
gain seekers arrive. It is- easier for teachers to 



298 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

go to the working places than it is for the workers 
to travel to the school. The eagerness with which 
the more ambitious seek supplemental education 
is shown by the fact that in Chicago and New 
York, some students enrolled in technical night 
courses travel twenty-five miles three evenings 
a week for the sake of attending classes. Some 
advantage is also gained by offering the educa- 
tional features in connection with other privileges, 
physical or social, the continued interest of many 
people being dependent upon identification with 
an associated group of varied privileges, offering 
not only self -improvement,, but recreation. The 
educational work of the Young Men's Christian 
Association perhaps best illustrates this point, 
for many of its students use the reading rooms 
and lunch counter before the class meets and join 
in the gymnasium games at the close of the les- 
son. There is too much tendency for people to 
seek recreation independent of instruction. The 
social centers which are being introduced in some 
cities are an attempt to combine wholesome recrea- 
tion and companionship with self-improvement. 
May we have more of them. 

Contact with outside world. 

In order to maintain the closest possible work- 
ing contact with the employed classes it is nec- 
essary to have in the leadership of supplemental 



SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION 299 

educational movements a number of individuals 
representative of the various walks of life. This 
applies particularly to the vocational courses. 
Advisory boards, made up of practical trades- 
men, should assist the regular educational au- 
thorities in laying out the courses and in seeing 
that the results accomplished are in accord with 
the best practice. The active participation of 
these representatives will insure that the move- 
ment will be constantly attuned to current condi- 
tions and needs, and saved from being either dis- 
torted in the hands of fanatics, or crystallized 
into an arbitrary educational system entirely 
dominated by professional schoolmasters. There 
is need, as in perhaps no other form of educa- 
tional work, for liberally trained, energetic and 
tactful supervision, for most supplemental educa- 
tional movements must be launched and main- 
tained by sheer force of inducement and per- 
sonal leadership, the work being practically in- 
jected into situations which reveal no conscious 
or intelligent demand. The supervisor of such 
movements must be not only thoroughly sympa- 
thetic with the purposes and activities of funda- 
mental educational institutions working espe- 
cially for the student class, but must also be 
keenly sensitive to the educational needs and pos- 
sibilities of the great non-school population. 
The remarkable growth and success of the even- 



300 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

ing lecture courses given under the auspices of the 
Board of Education of New York City and super- 
vised by Dr. H. M. Leipziger, who devotes his 
whole time to such work, is convincing evidence 
of the value of expert supervision. In no less 
degree is this fact brought out in the work of 
Cooper Union, New York City; Pratt Evening 
Institute, Brooklyn, N. Y. ; Spring Garden Even- 
ing Institute, Philadelphia, Pa. ; and Lewis Even- 
ing Technical Institute, Chicago, 111., with their 
thousands of enrolled students and hundreds of 
graduates who have received instruction in 
courses as definitely organized and managed as 
are any schools conducted during the daytime. 

Credit for the work done. 

Since supplemental educational movements deal 
mainly with a different class and have different 
objects in view from the schools proper, it will be 
found expedient that not only courses of study, 
and frequently methods of treatment be distinc- 
tive, but also where formal recognition or credits 
are given for work done, that these credits shall 
also be distinctive, the forms of certificates being 
sufficiently detailed and specific to avoid any mis- 
judgment of value, or confusion with the credits 
for systematic student work in fundamental edu- 
cational institutions. Experience in evening 
trade school work has shown the need of making 



SUPPLE:\rENTAL EDUCATION 301 

the school certificate very specific in its charac- 
ter. It is not sufficient to state that the student 
has satisfactorily pursued a course in machine 
shop practice or that he has taken a course in 
mechanical drawing, for the student is apt to use 
this certificate in obtaining a position and after 
he has been at work for a time the employer dis- 
covers that the young man is not qualified to do 
the required work for he may have learned only 
to run a lathe in the school and perhaps is abso- 
lutely unqualified to handle a milling machine. 
Naturally, this brings discredit upon the school. 
A better plan would be to have the school certifi- 
cate state that the young" man has pursued a 
given course for a certain number of hours and 
that he has learned to adjust and run certain 
specific machines, or in the case of a course in 
drafting, that he is familiar with orthogTaphic 
projection and simple working drawings. Care 
used in specifying what the student can do will 
avoid embarrassment both to the school and stu- 
dent. However, such specific credits should be 
readily convertible into a substantial and digni- 
fied form of school diploma. While intrinsically 
a diploma may be nothing but a bit of paper, it 
often means as much to an evening school stu- 
dent as to a college graduate. At the same time, 
the majority of those enrolled in supplemental 
education give little thought to formal credits. 



302 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

being satisfied with the personal returns from the 
privileges enjoyed. 

Evening schools for industrial workers. 

Primarily this chapter is for the purpose of 
calling attention to the general problem of even- 
ing schools for the industrial workers. It is in- 
tended to emphasize the importance of adapting 
evening instruction to the needs of modern indus- 
try and its workers, and to bring out certain fund- 
amental points which must be considered if such 
instruction in our public schools is to be more 
efficient. This preliminary survey of the whole 
field of supplemental education has been made in 
order to bring out the growing importance of the 
movement. An important educational move in 
the immediate future will be in the direction of 
improving the instruction of evening schools and 
adapting them to the needs of industrial workers. 
Undoubtedly the methods of these schools should 
be recast. They should adapt themselves to mod- 
ern industrial conditions, and through proper 
instruction in practical subjects, touch more 
closely the economic life of the times. The stu- 
dents in these schools have already received a 
more or less formal education in the public 
schools. They are receiving in their daily work 
incidental industrial experience, and have learned 
from this thorough but expensive teacher, that 



SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION 303 

they are deficient in some lines; hence, this en- 
deavor, ontside of their working hours, to fit 
themselves for definite lines of activity. 

Vital needs. 

There are certain vital needs in the organiza- 
tion and methods of conducting evening industrial 
improvement schools. In common with all sup- 
plemental education, voluntarily sought, these 
schools, as has already been implied, deal definitely 
with two rather distinct classes. The first are 
those who are naturally students and seek educa- 
tional advantages in the advanced lines of mathe- 
matics, mechanics, chemistry, etc., with a definite 
purpose. The school for industrial foremen con- 
ducted under the auspices of the Massachusetts In- 
stitute of Technology, likewise the Lewis Institute 
of Chicago, Cooper Union of New York City, and 
Pratt Institute of Brooklyn, N. Y., in their applied 
science courses, appeal to this class of students. 
The second class are those who are not naturally 
students, who still, with a more or less definite aim, 
seek educational help in the solution of some 
present and pressing problem which involves 
special educational service. The latter class is 
concerned with shop mathematics, plan reading, 
shop practice, etc. Most of the academic and 
shop instruction in the Stuyvesant Evening School 
of Trades, New York City,- the evening industrial 



304 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

classes in Lawrence, Massachusetts, tlie various 
evening trade schools in Buffalo, New York, 
Springfield, Massachusetts, and similar schools, 
reach this group of students. The recognition 
of these two classes means that the courses of 
instruction must be of two kinds^ — one comparing 
favorably with the day school work in its general 
scheme; the other, the major part, differing de- 
cidedly in methods from those ordinarily pursued. 

Teachers make the school. 

Mention has been made of the importance of 
good supervision in all supplemental education. 
It is of even more importance that the best 
teachers be employed in evening industrial schools. 
Day school teachers are employed too much at 
present. These teachers may be able to meet the 
needs of the student class but they cannot prop- 
erly teach the non-student class. To the custom of 
employing day school teachers must be laid much 
of the lack of definiteness in the planning of 
evening industrial school work. Obviously, it is 
natural for the average day school teacher to 
adopt for his evening instruction the regular 
science and mathematical text books and to use 
the regular outlines and methods. This is a 
perfectly consistent action, for few regular 
teachers have had opportunity to know the vital 
industrial needs of their students. 



SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION 305 

Now, even on the book side, tlie only people 
competent to teach in onr evening- industrial 
schools are the men and women who know the 
vital points of interest which concern the workers 
who come to the evening schools to meet definite 
needs from their actual contact with modern in- 
dustrial and commercial life. At present the 
schools which are doing the most efficient work are 
employing practical mechanics and young engi- 
neers to teach the shopwork and bookwork. More- 
over, this is a good way to discover good teach- 
ing material for the day trade schools, which 
suffer more or less because of a lack of practical 
as well as experienced teachers. 

The direct appeal. 

Evening school instruction must appeal to the 
student immediately at the beginning of his work. 
The subject-matter of the early lessons must sat- 
isfy the student's need as he has defined it. The 
success of evening instruction absolutely depends 
upon tliis principle. 

For example, a young machinist has received 
a reprimand from his foreman because he cannot 
read a working drawing with sufficient skill to do 
properly his daily work. He enrolls in a draft- 
ing course to meet that deficiency and finds that 
the first two lessons are concerned with letter 
plates, the next three with drawing straight and 



306 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

curved lines and the handling of instruments, and 
that the remainder of the term is to be spent on 
the projection of points, lines, surfaces and solids. 
During this time he is receiving in his daily work 
the same reprimands, and is therefore debating 
in his own mind the value of his evening instruc- 
tion. 

It is undoubtedly true that the drawing course 
here outlined is a proper one for teaching me- 
chanical drawing to those who are to be drafts- 
men, but the average apprentice machinist does 
not see the direct application of this instruction 
to his work. He enrolled for a definite purpose. 
To be sure, it was a narrow one, but nevertheless, 
it had economic value to him. It would be per- 
fectly possible to give in the first evening some 
elementary instruction in the reading of simple 
drawings; to teach him in five lessons where to 
look for the dimensions denoting length, breadth 
and thickness; to show him the principles of 
simple sectional drawings and to cause him to 
comprehend the laying out of holes for drilling. 

Instead of leaving school at the end of the fifth 
lesson, with no instruction which appealed to him, 
he would have received enough in those five les- 
sons to fit him to meet the demands of his fore- 
man and it is more than likely that he would 
have remained in the drafting class to receive 
the more definite and thorough instruction in the 



SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION 307 

theory of mechanical drawing such as must be 
gained if one is fully to comprehend and cover 
the entire range of the subject. We have much 
to learn from the methods employed in training 
shop men to read drawings, making sketches and 
simple working drawings in the drafting courses 
given in the apprenticeship systems of the New 
York Central and the Erie Eailroads. 

Flexible courses. 

It has already been stated that the various 
features must be elective and flexible and pre- 
sented in small and varied units. Instead of 
presenting in a course of study the subjects of 
arithmetic, geometry, etc., there should be printed 
** arithmetic for mechanics,'^ ^'arithmetic for 
clerks, '' '^ mechanical drawing for apprentices," 
etc. Where it is possible, even a finer differ- 
entiation is desirable, such as "arithmetic for 
plumbers," "arithmetic for errand boys," "me- 
chanical drawings for machine tenders," etc. 
Not only will this presentation serve to catch the 
eye of the prospective student, but it will also 
suggest to him that special effort is to be made 
in the class work to help him in his daily occu- 
pation. This form of advertising is a reason for 
much of the success of the correspondence 
schools. The instruction in the various branches 
must be adapted to the n^eds of the various oc- 



308 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

cupations. The terms used in tlie classroom 
must savor of the shop, office and store. Ex- 
perience shows that the problem, ^^What is % of 
37% r^ does not appeal so much to a clerk as the 
problem, ^^What will % of a yard of cloth cost at 
37% cents a yardT' On the other hand, the lat- 
ter problem does not awaken the interest of the 
mechanic as much as the problem involving the 
same operations which reads, ^'If a copper cast- 
ing weighs 37% pounds and specific gravity 
of iron is % that of copper, what will the casting 
weigh if made of iron ? " 

Any evening school with an enrollment which 
requires the formation of more than one class in 
a given subject, can divide its class enrollment 
into at least two divisions: first, for those en- 
gaged in industrial work, and second, for those en- 
gaged in commercial work. The larger the 
enrollment, the finer the differentiation as based 
upon the daily occupations of the students. The 
Mechanics Institute in New York City offers 
nine distinct courses in drawing — carriage draft- 
ing, machine drafting, builders' drafting, etc. 
The same subject-matter needs different treat- 
ment for different lines of activity. For example, 
the course in arithmetic for the apprentices in 
the Fore Eiver Shipbuilding Company at Quincy, 
Massachusetts, has nothing in common with the 
arithmetic course in the Textile School in Lud- 



SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION 309 

low, Massachusetts, except that both use the same 
fundamental operations. But it is doubtful if 
students in either school could exchange class- 
room work without embarrassment, and it would 
be absolutely out of the question for a boy well 
grounded in arithmetical operations but with no 
knowledge of either trade, to do anything with 
the problems of either industry. 

Sequence of courses. 

It is important that evening schools have a se- 
quential arrangement of courses. The majority 
of such schools pay no attention to the needs of 
the advanced student. Economy of administra- 
tion does not appear to make it worth while to 
make provision for him. The private schools 
have done much better. For example. Cooper 
Union of New York City has definite four-year 
courses, and experience shows that, while the ad- 
vanced classes began with small numbers, they 
have gradually reached a large enrollment. If the 
student's transient need is well met, it will place 
him in a better position, only to make him feel a re- 
newed need of self-improvement. Probably the 
greatest service can be done such a student in 
meeting his need as he sees it ; afterward he may 
be willing to meet the need as the teacher sees it. 
This means that he will return to the evening 
school ia some subsequent year when he ought to 



310 THE WORKER AxND THE STATE 

be given advanced work. Experience teaches that 
evening schools are so overcrowded in the ele- 
mentary courses that these advanced students 
suffer through insufficient attention. If specially 
provided for, they might become our foremen, 
superintendents and managers. Not only must 
each school year's work be driven home and 
clinched, but each series of years' work be so 
clinched as to meet the needs of industry, which 
is demanding thoroughly trained men for fore- 
man ships. 

Departmental system unsuitable. 

The student will do better work if the instruc- 
tion in the related branches of certain occupa- 
tions is given under one teacher, rather than 
under the departmental system of specialists in 
each branch. The student should not elect more 
than two or three subjects, the major one bearing 
directly upon his daily work, the others somewhat 
related to the main one. It is this major subject 
which has drawn the student into the school and 
it is this which will keep him there if, along with 
it, one or two allied subjects are taught in a 
practical manner by the teacher of the major sub- 
ject. The student will understand better the 
connection between these subjects because the 
teacher has himself a clear conception of the 
relationship. For instance, a machinist enrolls in 



SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION 311 

an evening school for mechanical drawing, and 
finds that he needs to brush np in fractions and 
decimals and that he needs square root in order 
to work out a formula for screw threads. The 
opportune time to teach him these topics is when 
the need for them arises, and none is more quali- 
fied to give the required practical instruction in 
such topics than a competent drawing teacher. 
In the Cambridge, Massachusetts, Evening Indus- 
trial School the teacher of machine shop practice 
devotes a portion of the time to teaching shop 
mathematics to his students. When large classes 
demand assistant teachers, these assistants should 
be assigned to teaching applied mathematics 
through individual instruction at the drawin;*^; 
table and benches, or else to giving instruction 
to small groups in an adjoining room, keeping 
before the mind of the student the direct connec- 
tion between arithmetic and handwork. When 
the student has reached a place in the drafting- 
course dealing with the subject of screw threads, 
it becomes necessary for him to apply some such 

formula as P=0.24 Vd+0.625— 0.175 where P is 
the pitch of the thread and d is the diameter of 
the bolt. This problem involves square root and 
decimals. One hour of individual or small group 
instruction by the drawing teacher will give the 
student the necessary familiarity with these 
mathematical processes ta make them sufficiently 



312 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

clear to -him in their application to the formula. 
Instead of thorough preparation in mathematics 
before electing mechanical drawing, it would be 
better to have the mechanical drawing lead the 
students into mathematics. 

Classification by vocations. 

Students must be grouped in the vocational 
classes according to their trade or business. The 
old workingman's guilds were founded for the 
purpose of social intercourse and mental stim- 
ulus. Each trade had its own guild. The daily 
trade experiences of each member became the 
property of all members. Discussions relating to 
the practices of their chosen trade occupied their 
attention. 

To-day workingmen have common trade inter- 
ests, and in some unions one will find that mem- 
bers discuss shop processes as a part of the reg- 
ular evening program. The present Textile 
School at Lawrence, Massachusetts is the out- 
growth of a small school organized by the 
Weavers Union and supported by it for a num- 
ber of years. My first visit to the headquarters 
of a local trade union was a surprise and an in- 
spiration. I had a preconceived notion that the 
meetings were devoted to agitation and to forcing 
industrial issues; but a library of up-to-date 
technical books, a class leader and a regular 



SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION 313 

course of instruction convinced me of my error. 
My conversion was complete when I was asked 
to give twenty lessons in advanced mathematics 
and I shall always remember with pleasure the 
earnestness of this group. 

It is easily seen that students grouped accord- 
ing to occupation have an opportunity to talk over 
their trade interests, the teacher acting as a 
leader and drawing out the students into telling 
their trade experiences and through the expres- 
sion of these various opinions obtaining the most 
practical solution of the particular problem at 
hand. Teachers who have had evening school 
experience know how difficult it is to get the stu- 
dents to recite and express themselves at the 
blackboard. A free discussion of the point at is- 
sue makes the student lose his self-consciousness 
and before he is aware of it he is at the board 
illustrating his particular method of solution. I 
remember in particular one teacher of steam 
boiler practice who aroused the greatest anima- 
tion among the students by the obviously success- 
ful method of having them tell their industrial ex- 
periences with the particular type of boiler they 
were using. Each member was defending his 
method of firing and cleaning as though it was the 
only one — in fact, the discussion became almost 
bitter at times. The training in power of expres- 
sion was not the least of the benefits. But of 



314 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

course such discussions must be under wise guid- 
ance. 

Special text books. 

Five years ago there was not a text book writ- 
ten expressly for evening schools. Such books 
are appearing to-day, and more will come as 
teachers demand them. What is needed, for in- 
stance, is not an elaborate text book in general 
arithmetic, with all its topics of fractions, deci- 
mals, square root, percentage, interest, partial 
payments, bank discounts, etc., but rather a book 
which appeals to a man in the machine trades; 
one which appeals to a plumber, or a clerk, or an 
errand boy; small enough to slip into the side 
pocket of a coat and cheap enough so that he can 
readily own a copy for reference in his daily work. 

What may he done. 

We refer to the trade schools of Germany as 
being ideal; but we forget that the majority of 
these schools are evening schools where a portion 
of the day-school equipment is set apart for the 
use of those already engaged in the trades. 
Every industrial center in America could throw 
open the doors of its schoolhouses for its workers 
and offer instruction in the technique of the 
trades. And this is one thing that every city 



SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION 315 

within the limits of its school equipment can offer 
and should be willing to offer. The schools 
should open all their shops, their laboratories 
and their courses in science, mathematics and 
mechanical drawing to those who have the great- 
est need for the instruction which these facilities 
are designed to give. To most of those engaged 
in industrial occupations, who have experienced 
the lack of opportunity in the modern shop, such 
instruction as these schools could give would be 
a liberal education. A practical teacher in an 
ordinary school-room, with a class of industrial 
workers, in itself would form an evening trade 
school. With much expenditure of personal in- 
sight and force on the part of educators, and a 
little financial outlay on the part of the munici- 
pality, this country could develop the very thing 
that we discuss so freely and initiate so slowly. 
To every earnest workman such a plan would 
mean a certain degree of breadth in place of nar- 
rowness, increased power, greater self-respect, 
greater value to himself and those dependent upon 
him. Moreover, the young man, who has been 
stationed for &ve years at the same machine and 
might otherwise remain there ten years longer, 
is set free to range among a large number of ma- 
chines and become familiar with them all. 



316 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

Advantage of the plan. 

It may be said that such schools are not trade 
schools in the most complete sense of the term. 
We may grant that they fall far short of answer- 
ing the need for thorough and comprehensive in- 
dustrial training for the youth of our country, for 
their pupils are limited to those already employed 
in the trades, who wish to improve their knowl- 
edge of the trade they follow, or, perhaps, fit 
themselves to take up a more profitable one. To 
supplement and facilitate shop training and to 
enable mechanics to do a high grade of work is 
the office of such schools. For this reason they 
will receive the support of employers of labor, 
who will welcome any means whereby their men 
may be trained to do a better quality of work. 
They will appeal to the men themselves, whose 
shop training has, for the most part, been limited 
to narrow lines, because they open the door to a 
wider range of practice, to a broader knowledge 
of their trade and to what naturally follows, a 
promotion with higher wages. 

MaMng a he ginning. 

Already some day-schools which have well 
equipped shops and drawing rooms are offering 
night courses and are thus bringing to our at- 
tention a sensible solution of the relationship 
which should exist between factory workers and 



SUPPLEMENTAL EDUCATION 317 

the public schools. These schools will be instru- 
mental in bringing about a more general system 
of trade instruction throughout the country be- 
cause of their direct exemplification of the bene- 
fits of trade training, even if this training is given 
only to those who are already employed during 
the day in shops and factories. The plan need 
cost but little. The buildings and internal equip- 
ment already exist. There will be no cost of 
maintenance beyond the necessary heat, light, 
power, materials and instruction. Five years 
ago there were less than a dozen evening trade 
schools in the country making use of the shops 
and teaching force of the public day industrial 
and technical high schools. To-day there are at 
least twenty-eight such schools. May the num- 
ber continue to increase. Classes are being con- 
ducted in machine shop practice, plumbing, pat- 
ternmaking, cabinet work, electricity, drawing, 
shop mathematics, etc. The courses as laid out 
for these several departments are as thorough and 
complete as it is possible to make them in an 
evening school. The attendance upon these 
schools is very large and remarkably constant, 
being better than that in most night schools. In 
this way men already employed in the trades, who 
know, therefore, at least a part of the trade in 
which they are employed, are given an opportu- 
nity to broaden their mechanical training and to 
make themselves more efficient workmen. 



A DECLAEATION OF PRINCIPLES 

IF the time has come and the conditions are 
ripe for the movement we have in mind we 
should organize it upon a plan that will work. 
If we have to compromise or exercise sub- 
terfuge in order to avoid issues, we are not yet 
ready for action, and, notwithstanding the press- 
ing need of immediate entrance upon a compre- 
hensive scheme of industrial education, let us 
wait until we are in a position where we can stand 
erect, look things squarely in the face and advance 
to certain victory. 

In view of the facts and arguments presented 
in the preceding chapters of this book, it would 
seem that the following principles, suggestions 
and tentative plans may serve as a basis for fur- 
ther study and positive action. 

Nature of the problem. 

It must be admitted that the movement is pri- 
marily a problem in education and not merely 
a manufacturers' problem of supplying the pres- 
ent lack of skilled labor. It is not a problem to 

318 



A DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES 319 

be considered in any narrow educational sense, 
but rather in a comprehensive survey of the press- 
ing needs of our schools, our children and our in- 
dustries. 

In no way will its proper solution cause any 
class distinctions in education, lower the present 
standard of education or cater to special inter- 
ests. Eather it will develop a greater civic and 
industrial efficiency among our people than is pos- 
sible under present methods. 

Vocational education as a part of a public school 
system, should be made flexible and adaptable to 
all conditions — a system that should give equality 
of educational opportunity and should not limit its 
facilities to those who can stay in school in order 
to reap its advantages. Undoubtedly, we are 
called upon to-day to train our boys and girls in 
an industrial democracy, and our educational sys- 
tem will succeed just to the extent that we make 
it focus upon the needs of each member of this de- 
mocracy. 

A chasm to he bridged. 

It should be conceded that a chasm exists be- 
tween our educational system and our modern in- 
dustrial life, and industrial education ought to 
bridge it. In the school we have, on the one hand, 
a number of discouraged boys and girls, abnor- 
mal s, belated s and delinquents, finding themselves 



320 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

unable mentally and physically to continue with 
credit in the culture process of our secondary 
schools ; on the other hand, we find that science, in- 
vention and specialization continue to withdraw 
boys and girls from the oldtime ''chores" — from 
former occupations which gave mental develop- 
ment, and to transplant them beside the automatic 
machine of our factories. 

Selection of vocation. 

Public education must concern itself with the 
proper selection of boys and girls to enter various 
callings in industrial, commercial or agricultural 
life for which their circumstances or natural abili- 
ties best fit them. There are economic as well as 
educational considerations, quite different from 
the usually accepted notions, concerning the func- 
tions and responsibilities of the ordinary schools. 
The recent agitation looking towards the establish- 
ment of vocational bureaus in connection with our 
public schools is in line with this thought. 

Industrial education ought to awaken a new 
school interest and so help retain boys and girls in 
school longer and contribute more powerfully to 
their development. This training given to pupils 
of thirteen or fourteen years of age, when they 
are of little value in a business way, should pre- 
pare them to enter some branch of actual industrial 
work. 



A DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES 321 

Conservation of children. 

The conservation of our children is as important 
as the conservation of other natural resources 
such as water power, forests and mines. Reli- 
able statistics regarding the number of pupils 
who drop out of our public schools, are lacking; 
but we know that the number is large and is 
a menace to our civic welfare. It is extremely 
difficult to hold children in school in those cities 
which have a large foreign population. It is be- 
lieved that industrial training will have an eco- 
nomic value in the eyes of the parents which will 
assist in keeping children in school. 

A justifiable expense. 

Expenditure for vocational education is ex- 
penditure for civic improvement. There is a di- 
rect relationship between the earning capacity 
of our people and the expenditures for civic wel- 
fare. Our homes, churches, schools, streets, li- 
braries, parks and other social betterments are 
supported by the people; a large share of the 
tax for the support of these institutions comes 
from our great industries and their workers. 
The number of persons engaged in gainful occu- 
pations in the United States is over 30,000,000, of 
which 36% are engaged in agricultural pursuits, 
25% in manufacturing and mechanical pursuits, 
19% in domestic and pergonal service, 16% in 



322 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

trade and transportation and 4% in professional 
service. The wealth production on farms is 
$7,900,000,000 a year, while the gross value of the 
product of factories is $14,800,000,000. The wages 
of factory workers amounts to $2,600,000,000 a 
year, while the gross farm income is $4,200,000,- 
000 a year. These values are increased and re- 
turned to the people by outlays on municipal im- 
provements providing for greater civic efficiency. 
Still greater returns are received from money ex- 
pended for industrial education. 

No single solution. 

If industrial education means a redirecting and 
adapting of our education to fit the economic and 
social needs of the people of varying communities, 
then it is a problem which has no single solution. 
There will be as many school classifications as 
there are groups of industries and nearly as many 
solutions as there are types of communities. 
There is no single inflexible course of study nor 
any single fixed line of procedure. 

A look into the future. 

Industrial education may well stand upon some 
such platform as has been suggested. At the 
same time we ought to keep in mind some sort of 
perspective. If the platform is solid and the 



A DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES 323 

perspective is true, then it will be only a question 
of methods to accomplish the result. Let us take 
a look into the future. 

It is universally agreed that the public school 
system is bound to be modified by the new exter- 
nal influences which will come from industrial edu- 
cation and that no real and lasting progress will 
be made in the latter until the schools are redi- 
rected in the interests of the people. They need 
education in terms of their environment, — the 
training of men and women along agricultural 
and industrial lines. It is not necessary to have 
an entirely new curriculum in order to redirect 
these schools. A portion of agricultural or in- 
dustrial practice can be expressed in mathemat- 
ical form; the study of history may take the 
form of industrial and economic development of 
the nation; geography can bfe taught in terms 
of environment; science in its relation to the 
great industrial processes upon which the lives of 
our people depend. One can conceive of an ele- 
mentary school in which no so-called agricultural 
courses exist, which will still present the subject 
vitally from day to day by means of the customary 
studies and exercises. Eeal and lasting progress in 
industrial education will be made only when all 
schools, industrial or otherwise, concern them- 
selves with the needs of human life, and in so far 



324 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

as industrial education tends to vitalize the whole 
school system, so far will its effectiveness be be- 
yond dispute. 

'An organic relationship. 

Trade schools and industrial and agricultural 
schools must sustain organic relations with the 
public school system. This involves some modi- 
fications in the present plan of the schools in order 
to give this newer education a comfortable and use- 
ful place. We must examine carefully our present 
courses of study; note the essentials in subject- 
matter; the demand for different groups of sub- 
jects and the probable profit of each group to the 
state and its people. The result of the accounting 
will be that our school term will be lengthened ; the 
courses will be simplified; they will be given an 
industrial trend through simple forms of hand- 
work which can be done in the regular school- 
rooms from the very beginning of the primary 
course. We shall find it to our advantage to give 
the children at all times work which appeals to 
their needs and aptitudes and they ought to com- 
plete the present work of the first six grades at an 
earlier age than now and thus enjoy a more ex- 
tended and efficient school period than is now pos- 
sible. Already New York and Massachusetts are 
devising ways and means of bringing about this 
readjustment. 



A DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES 325 

A restratification. 

Undoubtedly, this readjustment will modify the 
present relation of the elementary and secondary 
fields of education, for much of the discussion of 
the value of vocational training centers about the 
wasted years of the child's life between fourteen 
and sixteen. Thus far, every plan proposed either 
provides that the fourteen year old boy and girl 
elect vocational training regardless of his or her 
previous school training, or states that only chil- 
dren in grades higher than the sixth school year 
shall elect such training. It is obvious that both of 
these propositions break down the present de- 
marcation between the elementary and secondary 
fields. 

Several plans have been proposed. It has been 
announced by the New York State Education De- 
partment that the school system may well begin to 
separate at the end of the sixth grade into three 
very distinct branches. The larger part of the 
work of the present two upper grades will be uni- 
form, but some differentiation, looking finally to 
complete separation, will begin at that time. 
Three distinct courses of study, or classes of 
schools, will follow the elementary school pe- 
riod: (a) A high school system looking to en- 
trance into college; (b) business schools looking 
to work in offices, stores, etc.; (c) industrial and 
agricultural schools looking to the training of 



326 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

workers in these vocations. This plan involves 
that pupils in the ^^a'^ division will commence 
some study of a modern foreign language if they 
are headed for the literary and classical high 
school; that in the *^b" division, some special 
commercial studies will be introduced for pupils 
headed for advanced business schools; and that 
in the ^^c'' division, special training with tools and 
in the household and domestic arts will be offered 
for those who are to stop with the vocational 
school or who are to go on to the trade schools or 
agricultural high schools. This restratification 
will make it possible for pupils, teachers and par- 
ents to direct their energies toward the work that 
pupils are ultimately to do, and by the time the 
children have completed the eighth or ninth year 
they will find abundant opportunity to this end 
besides some enthusiasm for a school which qual- 
ifies them for their life-work, whether it be pro- 
fessional, industrial or along the lines of business 
activity. (See diagram on page 329.) 

Articulation with labor laws. 

Furthermore there should be the closest rela- 
tionship between the state laws regarding the age 
of compulsory school attendance and any proposed 
laws relating to industrial education. All advo- 
cates of industrial education base their claims 
upon the years wasted between fourteen and six- 



A DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES 327 

teen. There is little use in proposing a form of 
education, necessarily expensive and complicated, 
unless we strike at the root of the evil. 

As far as possible, the employment of immature 
children in our industries, on lines of work which 
are not conducive to mental growth, should be 
prevented. Industrial enterprises which require 
intelligent individual effort on the part of young 
workers do not want the boy until he is sixteen 
years of age. Unskilled industries now take him 
when he is very immature and assign him to work 
which lacks educational content. Every boy and 
girl up to the age of at least sixteen should be 
engaged in work profitable to the body, mind and 
soul, or should be in a school which it is hoped 
may be even more profitable. School laws and 
industrial schools must work together; and child 
labor laws should be so modified that they will 
closely articulate with industrial school plans. 

A new and important step. 

Without any question, the most far-reaching 
phase of this new educational movement will be 
the establishment of continuation schools. Thus 
far in this country, we are totally unprepared for 
this type of industrial education. Before much 
can be done in this direction, laws will have to be. 
enacted requiring employers to regulate their af- 
fairs so that their employees may attend these 



Leading Purpose with Differentiated Studies, 

The educational system may separate into three very 
distinct branches at the end of the first six years of the 
school course. The larger part of the work of the sev- 
enth and eighth grades will consist of the regular gram- 
mar school studies, directed toward industries, com- 
merce, or the traditional high school courses, according 
to the leading purpose. In the present seventh grade 
there might be commenced some high school studies by 
pupils likely to enter the literary and classical high 
schools; some special commercial subjects by pupils 
headed for the advanced business schools; and some 
special training at benches with tools, in the household 
arts, and in elementary agriculture for those who are 
to stop with the elementary schools, or are to go on with 
the industrial or trade schools, or the schools of agricul- 
ture. At least half of the teachers in the seventh and 
eighth grades might be men; and these grades may well 
be housed in central and especially prepared rooms. 



328 



DIFFERENTIATED STUDIES LEADING TO 




GRAMMAR SCHOOL.. 



; STUDIES DIRECTED TOWARDS 
'""•'""^ THE LEADING PURPOSE ' 



2'"'YEAR 



l"YEAR 




OlFrCRENTUTEO STUDIES 
fOR THE OIFFERENT CROUPS 
OF STUDENTS WHOSE ULTtMATI 
PURPOSES DIFFER. 



329 



330 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

continuation schools at least four or five hours a 
week and receive instruction in industrial or 
academic subjects. Obviously, it is easy to make 
such a statement, but it is going to be difficult to 
devise a plan of procedure. 

We are acquainted with the general scheme of 
German continuation schools. But Germany is 
not America, and manufacturers in this country 
are apt to feel that too many laws are already 
in the statute books along lines that restrict the 
rights of trade. At the same time, the problem 
of providing an education that will allow ^'earn- 
ing and learning'' will never be solved until there 
is some cooperation between a state educational 
policy and factory laws. It is within the limits 
of possibility that these continuation schools will 
be divided into four general phases : 

First, evening schools for those who wish to 
supplement their daily experience with such acad- 
emic and shop studies as will allow them to ad- 
vance another round on the economic ladder, tak- 
ing such courses as shop mathematics, mechanical 
drawing, and shop practice. This phase of con- 
tinuation school work has been elaborated in the 
chapter on supplemental education. 

Second, day continuation schools for those in 
our unskilled industries where they can receive 
instruction in civics, language and simple arith- 
metical processes. These courses will be for for* 



A DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES 331 

eign born children or those who have had inferior 
school training, but need nevertheless such cul- 
tural subjects as have been suggested in order 
that the state may preserve its American citizen- 
ship. 

Third, day continuation schools for those in our 
seyni-sMlled industries requiring a higher order of 
intelligence or offering opportunities for the ex- 
ercise of a higher order if the young people fit 
themselves for it. Such schools will offer shop 
mathematics, drawing and simple courses in sci- 
ence. The present ^^ schools in the factory'' de- 
scribed elsewhere point to the industrial need and 
present a possible solution. 

Fourth, public recreative centers and public 
evening lectures. Education for industrial work- 
ers must include a broader conception of educa- 
tional values than the teaching of industrial sub- 
jects, mathematics, civics and language. It must 
take into consideration the profitable spending of 
the worker's hours of leisure. The deadening in- 
fluence of work on the automatic machine can not 
be entirely eliminated by such studies as have 
been suggested. The preservation of our indus- 
trial democracy requires wholesome recreation 
for these people. Even industrial establishments 
have found that apprenticeship systems and in- 
dustrial education do not adequately meet the 
problem. The significance of modern industry 



332 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

has a social as well as industrial aspect. It has 
been treated in the chapter on the significance of 
modern industry. 

To work it out, 

A platform and a perspective have been pre- 
sented. Methods of procedure are now in order. 
Naturally one questions why industrial education 
should be the concern of state or national gov- 
ernment. 

In the first place it ranks with the problems of 
state canals, highways, forest reservations and 
water power, for conservation of children is as 
important as the conservation of the state's other 
natural resources. Moreover if it is necessary to 
discuss such questions as finding foreign markets 
for our goods, importation of skilled labor and 
protecting infant industries through a protective 
tariff, surely it is equally important to study 
means of increasing the efficiency of the labor that 
enters into our marketable product, especially in 
view of the fact that there is a constantly growing 
proportion of labor cost to total production cost. 

In the second place, the success of maintaining 
industrial education will depend upon state aid, 
for cities and towns will have to be encouraged 
by liberal state support. Generally speaking, no 
trade schools or agricultural schools have been 
successful without such aid. The equipment of 



A DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES 333 

these schools is expensive, the salaries of their 
teachers are higher than in the common schools 
and other expenses of maintenance greater. 
More than this, it is well nigh impossible to edu- 
cate local school boards to the point where they 
are ready to expend funds raised by a local tax 
for the entire support of a system of schools 
which is so obviously a great factor in the ad- 
vance of the industries of the whole state. 

It is clear that the state should aid local 
schools; for whether these localities take up in- 
dustrial education or not is often a question of 
community ability, and no child should be disad- 
vantaged by the locality in which he lives. Eatio 
of population to taxable property differs so widely 
that the state must see to it that the educational 
chances are evened up. However, the. state 
should not pay all the expenses of industrial ed- 
ucation. Local enterprise and responsibility 
should be developed. 

Industrial, trade and agricultural schools must 
be close to the people. Educational democracy 
can not be realized if our people are required to 
attend schools at a great distance, where there 
is the expense of board and rooms, individ- 
ual loss to pupils of home influence and loss 
to parents of that help which children often 
contribute outside of school hours. Moreover, 
the class of children which will enter these schools 



334 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

cannot afford to go away to school and it is not 
best that they should. A central authority is 
needed to economize effort and properly adjust 
the work which various communities may contem- 
plate. Care must be exercised so that there will 
be no such duplication of effort in closely allied 
communities as would cause educational waste. 
These schools should be planned with reference 
to the educational and industrial interests of the 
state as a whole. Unfortunately, in some states 
agricultural schools are springing up with no cen- 
tral educational body responsible for them. One 
town desires a school. It may be needed, but be- 
fore it can obtain the money from the legislature 
the members of some other district insist that 
theirs should have a school as well. 

The state and the nation. 

It is an open question whether a state or the na- 
tion should provide financial aid for industrial 
education. As has already been mentioned, Con- 
gress is annually appropriating large sums of 
money for agricultural and mechanic arts colleges. 
Leaders are trained in such institutions and after 
graduation their labors are not confined to the 
state in which they were educated, and Congress 
may well undertake new work in states for the pur- 
pose of showing the way and stimulating local am- 
bition when the work is of great magnitude. But in 



A DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES 335 

industrial education of elementary and secondary 
type, it may be quite another matter. The demand 
for this education should, and usually does, orig- 
inate in the local communities, and very likely it 
belongs to them to carry it out, for the people par- 
ticipating in this sort of education are not trained 
as leaders and do not immediately leave their 
school environment. It is quite another matter 
for these communities to go beyond the common- 
wealth and appeal to Congress. National aid is 
not usually given without an accompanying pro- 
vision of some government control. The Federal 
Constitution by omitting all reference to the mat- 
ter assumed that the states should control educa- 
tional policy within their borders. It is neverthe- 
less, a large question and the arguments are not 
by any means all on one side. 

A vital point. 

Into whose hands the state supervision of these 
schools should be placed is a question which can 
hardly admit of two sides, for it will be a serious 
mistake to commit the organization and adminis- 
tration of industrial schools to a special indus- 
trial commission and not to the public school au- 
thorities of the state and the subdivisions thereof. 
If the existing state boards of education are not 
capable of administering such education they 
should be strengthened by either the addition of 



336 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

an advisory board or by a reorganization of the 
present board. For any progress a special com- 
mission is obliged to rely on local advocates and 
on local school committees; and it is needless to 
create an expensive commission for the purpose 
of accomplishing that which we have every rea- 
son for assuming can be accomplished without 
additional state machinery. Under special condi- 
tions, commissions charged with the special duty 
of investigation may well be organized, but, after 
reporting to state legislatures, they should be dis- 
charged leaving their recommendations to be in- 
corporated in the general education law of the 
state. 

Furthermore, it is inconsistent with our ac- 
cepted theories of state and local government, to 
prohibit to the various communities of the state 
the same reasonable control over industrial 
schools which they tax themselves to support, as 
they exercise over their other educational enter- 
prises. Industrial education should be kept as 
much as possible under local control and manage- 
ment, for otherwise there will be an implied reflec- 
tion that local boards are not capable of managing 
educational affairs. Oftentimes, under special en- 
couragement by the state and with the coopera- 
tion of local boards, it will be possible to adapt 
existing buildings to industrial school purposes 
and thus avoid duplication of plants such as would 



A DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES 337 

exist if two state or local boards existed. Both 
the Massachusetts and New Jersey conimissioiis 
found that small communities felt they could 
hardly afford to establish two distinct systems of 
education. It is not a wise procedure from any 
standpoint — educational or financial. 

Shall tve isolate itf 

The next important consideration, and it is im- 
mense, is whether industrial schools should be sep- 
arated from schools devoted to ^^ general train- 
ing.'' There is a tendency to divorce the two, 
and in this way the establishment of separate 
schools of agriculture and industry is repeating 
for the schools of lower grade that which has been 
the history of the development of the agricultural 
and mechanic arts colleges. The Land Grant Act 
of 1862 established the latter colleges. The new 
education resulting was so unlike the old educa- 
tion in spirit that new colleges were established 
independently of the old. In some instances, the 
new was made a department of the old institu- 
tion. It did not thrive, the separate college be- 
ing free to do as it chose. However, this was 
changed, and the separate agricultural college 
no longer holds the leadership, being strongest 
when allied with some university. In fact, the 
newer education has made many state universities. 
These institutions have found that education that 



338 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

makes use of agricultural and industrial subjects 
is education quite as much and possibly more than 
that which was given in the terms of mathe- 
matics and philosophy. However, it is to be no- 
ticed that the agricultural colleges and schools 
connected with the universities are really schools 
within a school, each with its own dean, course of 
study, traditions and ultimate purposes. 

Significantly, the recent movement for indus- 
trial and agricultural education has started out to 
repeat educational history. We are attempting to 
isolate this latest educational movement by or- 
ganizing separate classes or schools. It may be 
wise to advocate special or distinct schools until 
they get their bearings, course of study, data, text- 
books, and some traditions worthy of preserva- 
tion; but everyone agrees that eventually much 
that there is in these schools must go into the reg- 
ular schools. These new separate schools are go- 
ing to be popular ; they will be useful and signifi- 
cant, and more of them will be demanded. 

But it will be a mistake to forever forbid a 
union of the old type with the new. On the other 
hand, it must be said that to attempt to incor- 
porate industrial education in a school where it 
will be dominated by the older tradition will be 
to defeat a plan of education for industrial work- 
ers which has already been defeated twice in the 



A DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES 339 

educational history of the past fifty years — once 
when the agricultural and mechanic arts colleges 
were established, and again when the manual arts 
were introduced. Possibly the times were not 
ripe. Many believe that to-day they are, and if 
industrial education is to succeed it must make its 
own traditions by creating a machinery that will 
do it. 

Confidence of all interests. 

It will be a false step to ignore the influence 
and support which trade unions can give to the 
movement. If based on broad lines, there is no 
reason for their failing to give their unqualified 
cooperation. If the state cannot develop a plan of 
procedure which will meet with the cooperation 
of employer and employee, of capitalist and of or- 
ganized labor, then we may well ask who can. To 
make more effective this cooperation it will be 
best to include in the law the appointing of local 
advisory boards to assist in the administration of 
these schools. Such boards will serve a double 
purpose: (a) establishing in the community a 
confidence in the technical work done in the trade 
school, and (b) reinforcing the school board in 
its appeal before city governments for financial 
support. 



340 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

Boy is the product. 

The question of the disposition of the product 
of trade schools will be raised. Here again the 
procedure will depend upon the industry repre- 
sented and the sentiments of the community. We 
must keep in mind that we are creating efficient 
workmen and not making products. If a finished 
product has to follow because of our educational 
ideal of the best way of making a finished boy, 
then it may be a wise and necessary procedure to 
make such products ; but common sense and public 
opinion will govern the local situation. 

Suitable teachers. 

The obtaining of suitable teachers for these 
schools opens up a large question. Our normal 
schools have been organized on the basis that they 
were primarily intended for the training of teach- 
ers for the elementary schools. Some have special 
departments in which special training is given so 
as to qualify its graduates to teach school garden- 
ing, drawing, cooking and shopwork. The techni- 
cal and industrial requirements of our industrial 
and trades schools are such that teachers must be 
very practical in their methods. In general, it 
may be said that it will be impossible for an aver- 
age normal school to fit its students for teaching 
positions in the industrial and trades schools un- 
less the students have had shop experience before 



A DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES 341 

entering the school or obtain such experience after 
graduation. 

There is no one who onght to be more qualified 
to teach in the trade schools than the competent, 
practical mechanic. But it is well to acknowledge 
that there will be some difificulty in obtaining such 
a man, especially in view of the fact that employers 
of labor find it difficult to obtain competent fore- 
men. But no greater argument of the need of 
trade instruction can be advanced than to acknowl- 
edge that not even can a few men be found who are 
competent to be teachers. The same difficulty will 
be experienced in obtaining teachers for the book- 
work in these schools. The average academic 
teacher has not received the training necessary to 
place the proper emphasis upon the application 
of science, mathematics, and shop accounts to va- 
rious trades. There is a promising field for am- 
bitious teachers who will qualify in this work. 

But, to return to the shop teacher. He should 
be practical. But if he is merely this, his teach- 
ing may be a failure. If he was taught by the 
**rule of thumb," he will probably teach by the 
same rule. Even though he may have been taught 
scientifically, he may have no ability to impart in- 
struction. If possible, no man should be per- 
mitted to teach who does not possess the following 
qualifications: Practical knowledge of his sub- 
ject ; skill in teaching ; tact in the management of 



342 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

boys and men; a good moral character, including 
freedom from all bad habits. 

A general state movement looking toward the 
establishment of industrial and trade schools will 
require a large number of teachers. It is readily 
seen that no one source of supply will be sufficient 
nor will one particular method of training be ad- 
visable. There are many types of schools to be 
established. If the state accomplishes its purpose 
there will be schools for all the trades. In conse- 
quence, no single plan for training teachers will 
meet the conditions. Several projects are sug- 
gested. 

The state normal schools may establish day 
courses for training teachers for industrial 
schools. Some are already equipped with shops, 
drawing rooms, and laboratories. However, they 
cannot be expected to train efficient industrial 
teachers unless the students electing the industrial 
course supplement their normal work with some 
practical experience in the shops. Conditions 
may be met in three ways : The student may have 
had his practical experience before he came to the 
normal school; he may get it after he has been 
graduated ; he may work vacations and Saturdays 
in the shops of the vicinity. 

Furthermore, these normal schools which are 
located near large industrial centers may have an 
evening department for training teachers by offer- 



A DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES 343 

ing to ambitious and well educated mechanics of 
tlie vicinity an opportunity for study in the prin- 
ciples and methods of education and in the treat- 
ment of subject-matter, as related to the spirit and 
purpose of industrial education. Already Teach- 
ers College has established such a department. 

In addition, evening continuation schools offer 
a splendid field for training and selecting efficient 
industrial teachers. Some of the best teachers in 
the present secondary technical schools have risen 
from the ranks of evening school teachers. In 
turn it may be said that evening school teachers 
have often been ambitious mechanics who have 
studied in correspondence schools and have seen 
the larger field of usefulness in the teaching pro- 
fession. 

Finally, there are some teachers in secondary 
technical schools and elementary manual training 
schools who would be qualified to teach in the 
trade schools if they had more grasp of the prac- 
tical shop methods. This last qualification could 
be secured if they were to devote several vacation 
periods to actual shop practice in some model in- 
dustrial establishment. Such practical training, 
combined with their knowledge of the principles of 
teaching, and their familiarity with boy life, would 
make them almost ideal teachers for these schools. 

All that has been said with reference to training 
of male teachers for shopwork holds equally true 



344 THE WORKER AND THE STATE 

for the training of female, teachers for girls' in- 
dustrial work. 

A hit of philosophy. 

In conclusion, it may be said that industrial, 
agricultural and technical schools should be of 
every kind for which there is a demand on the 
part of the people. There will have to be nearly 
as many school classifications as there are groups 
of industries; nearly as many solutions as there 
are types of communities. We must keep in mind 
that simple and balanced justice makes it neces- 
sary to give to wage earners and to the common 
industries such equivalent as we can for what the 
present schools are doing for those with gener- 
ous incomes and for the professional and manag- 
ing vocations. 

We are in the midst of a great task. We are 
working out the basis and the details of the great- 
est industrial democracy in human history. Let 
us lose nothing of our good humor and let us cul- 
tivate toleration of opinion and let us think 
straight, with an open mind. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY OF VOCATIONAL EDUCATION 

THE aim of this bibliography is to serve as an intro- 
ductory reading list on the subject of vocational 
education. It attempts to present a list of books help- 
ful to teachers, students and others interested in this 
phase of education, in a way that will give a grasp of 
the larger economic, social and educational questions 
that are at the basis of such training as is implied in the 
general title. The importance of the subject and its 
bearing upon fundamental questions of the hour forbid 
any less narrow treatment. Except in rare instances 
references to periodical articles are omitted. 

ECONOMICS AND INDUSTRY. 

Beard, Charles. The Industrial devolution, with a preface by 
F. York Powell. Sonnenschein, London; 1901. 

Biicher, Carl. Industrial Evolution, translated from the 3d Ger- 
man edition by S. M. Wickett. Holt, New York; 1901. 

Ely, Richard T. Studies in the Evolution of Industrial Society. 
MacMillan, New York; 1903. 

Gibbons, Henry de B. Industrial History of England. Methuen, 
London; 1890. 

Gilman, Mrs. Charlotte P. S. Women and Economics, a study 
of the economic relation between men and women as a factor 
in social evolution. Small, Boston; 1898. 

Howard, Earl D. Cause and Extent of the Recent Industrial 
Progress in Germany. Houghton, Boston; 1907. 

Laughlin, J. L. Industrial America. Scribner, New York; 1905. 

345 



346 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Marx, Karl. Machinery and Modern Industry. See his Capital, 
translated from 3d German edition. Humboldt, New York. 

Mosely. Industrial Commission to the U. S. A. October-Decem- 
ber, 1902. Eeport of the Delegates. Cassell, London; 1903. 

Thurston, Henry W. Economics and Industrial History for Sec- 
ondary Schools. Scott, Foresman & Co., Chicago; 1899. 

Webb, Sidney and Beatrice. Industrial Democracy. Longmans, 
New York; 1902. 

Wright, Carroll D. Industrial Evolution of the United States. 
Scribner, New York; 1897. 

U. S. Bureau of Labor. Wages and Hours of Labor in Manu- 
facturing Industries 1890 to 1905. See U. S. Bureau of 
Labor Bulletin, Volume 13, Number 65. Washington; 1906. 

SOCIAL CONDITIONS. 

Addams, Jane. Protection of children for industrial efficiency. 
See her Newer Ideals of Peace. MacMillan, New York; 1907. 

Addams, Jane. The Spirit of Youth and the City Streets. Mac- 
Millan, New York; 1909. 

American Academy of Political and Social Science. Child labor 
a menace to industry, education and good citizenship. Phila- 
delphia; 1906. 

Gompers, Samuel. Labor in Europe and America, Personal ob- 
servations, from an American viewpoint, of life and condi- 
tions of working men in Great Britain, France, Holland, Ger- 
many, Italy, etc. Harper, New York; 1910. 

Kelly, Florence. The Eights of Children. The Child, the State 
and the Nation. See her Ethical Gains Through Legislation. 
MacMillan, New York; 1905. 

More, Mrs. Louise Bolard. Wage Earners' Budgets, a study of 
standards and cost of living in New York City. Holt, New 
York; 1907. 

Stelzle, Charles, anon. Letters from a Workingman, by an 
American mechanic. Revell, New York; 1908. 

Woods, Robert A., Editor. Americans in Progress, a settlement 
study by residents and associates of the South End House. 
Houghton, Boston; 1902, 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 347 

EDUCATION AND SOCIETY. 

Abbott, Lyman. Educational Rights. 8ee his Rights of Man. 
Houghton, Boston; 1901. 

Dewev, John. The School and Society, being three lectures sup- 
plemented by a statement of the University elementary 
school. University of Chicago Press, Chicago; 1907. 

Carleton, Frank T. Education and Industrial Evolution. Mac- 
Millan, New York; 1908. 

Eliot, Charles W. Function of Education in Democratic Society. 
See his Educational Reform; essays and addresses. Century 
Co., New York; 1898. 

Hughes, Robert E. The Making of Citizens, a study in com- 
parative education. Scribner, New York; 1907. 

Miinsterberg, Hugo. The Choice of a Vocation. See his Ameri- 
can Problems. Moffat, New York; 1910. 

WOMEN IN INDUSTRY. 

Abbott, Edith. Women in Industry, a study in American eco- 
nomic history. Appleton, New York; 1910. 

Butler, Elizabeth B. Women and the Trades, Pittsburg survey 
findings. Charities Publishing Company, New York; 1909. 

Cadbury, Edward, and others. Women's Work and Wages, a 
phase of life in an industrial city. Chicago University Press, 
Chicago; 1907. 

Marshall, Florence M. Industrial Training for Women. Na- 
tional Society for the Promotion of Industrial Education 
Bulletin No. 4, New York; 1907. 

Massachusetts Bureau of Labor Statistics. Industrial education 
for working girls. Part I of annual report, Boston; 1905. 

Perkins, Agnes F. Vocations for the Trained Woman. Women's 
Educational and Industrial Union. Boston; 1910. 

Van Vorst, Mrs. John and Marie. The Woman Who Toils; being 
the experiences of two gentlewomen as factory girls. Double- 
day, New York; 1903. 

Women in Industry, from seven points of view. Duckworth, 
London; 1908. 



348 BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Wright, Carroll D. Employment of Women and Children. See 
his Outline of Practical Sociology. Longmans, New York; 
1909. 

EDUCATIONAL HISTORY, THEORY AND PRACTICE. 

Addams, Jane. Educational Methods. See her Democracy in So- 
cial Ethics. MacMillan, New York; 1902. 

Ayres, Leonard P. Elimination and Retardation of Pupils. A 
study of school conditions under the auspices of the Russell 
Sage Foundation. New York; 1910. 

Bailey, Liberty H. The School of the Future. See his Outlook 
to Nature. MacMillan, New York; 1902. 

Baldwin, William A. Industrial-Social Education. Bradley, 
Springfield, Mass.; 1903. 

Butler, Nicholas Murray. The Meaning of Education, and other 
essays and addresses. MacMillan, New York; 1898. 

Davenport, Eugene. Education for Efficiency, a discussion of 
certain phases of the problem of universal education with 
special reference to academic ideals and methods. Heath, 
Boston; 1909. 

DeGarmo, Charles. Principles of Secondary Education. Mac- 
Millan, New York; 1907. 

Draper, Andrew S. American Education, with an introduction 
by Nicholas Murray Butler. Houghton, Boston; 1909. 

Dutton, Samuel T. and Snedden, David D. Administration of 
Public Education in the United States. MacMillan, New 
York; 1908. 

Eliot, Charles W. Education for Efficiency and the New Defini- 
tion of the Cultivated Man. Houghton, Boston; 1909. 

Hall, G. Stanley. Adolescence, its psychology and its relation to 
physiology, anthropology, sociology, sex, crime, religion, and 
education. Appleton, New York; 1909. 

Mosely Educational Commission to the U. S. A. October-Decem- 
ber, 1903. Reports of the Commission. Co-operative Print- 
ing Society, London; 1903. 

O'Shea, Michael V. Dynamic Factors in Education. MacMillan, 
New York; 1906. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 349 

Snedden, David. The Combination of Liberal and Vocational 
Education. Educational Review Publishing Co., New York; 
1909. 

Thorndike, Edward L. The Elimination of Pupils from School. 
U. S. Bureau of Education, Bulletin No. 4, 1907. Washing- 
ton; 1908. 

Ware, Fabian. Educational Foundations of Trade and Industry. 
Appleton, New York; 1901. 

Wright, Carroll D. Education. See his Outline of Practical So- 
ciology. Longmans, New York; 1909. 

BROAD ASPECTS OF INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION. 

American Academy of Political and Social Science. Industrial 
Education. Philadelphia; 1909. 

Chicago Association of Commerce. Industrial Education in Hela- 
tion to Conditions in the City of Chicago. Published by the 
Association, Chicago; 1909. 

Draper, Andrew S. Our Children, Our Schools and Our Indus- 
tries. N. Y. State Education Department, Albany; 1908. 

Dyer, Henry. Industrial Training. See Ms Evolution of In- 
dustry. MacMillan, New York; 1895. 

Gillette, John M. Vocational Education. American Book Co., 
New York; 1910. 

Hanus, Paul. Beginnings in Industrial Education, and .other edu- 
cational discussions. Houghton, Boston; 1908. 

Massachusetts Commission on Industrial and Technical Educa- 
tion. Reports of the Commission, 1906-09, Boston. 

National Education Association. Report of the Committee on the 
Place of Industries in Public Education, July, 1910. 
Winona, Minn. 

Person, Harlow S. Industrial Education, a system of training 
for men entering upon trade and commerce. Houghton, Bos- 
ton; 1907. 

Snedden, David. Vocational Education. Houghton, Boston; 1910. 

(The) Movement for Industrial Education. See Charities and 
Commons (now the Survey). Vol, 19. October, 1907. New 
York. 



350 BIBLIOGEAPHY 

Walker, Francis A. See Ms Discussions on Education. Holt, 
New York; 1899. 

Wright, Carroll D. Industrial Education; Manual Training; 
Trade and Technical Schools; Results of Technical Educa- 
tion. See Ms Outline of Practical Sociology. Longmans, 
New York; 1909. 

TECHNICAL AND ECONOMIC ASPECTS. 

Creighton, Mandell. Value and Province of Technical Education, 
See Ms Thoughts on Education. Longmans, New York; 1902. 

Eaton, J. Shirley. Education for Efficiency in Railroad Service. 
Bulletin of U. S. Bureau of Education Number 10, Washing- 
ton; 1909. 

Hailmann, William N. German Views of American Education, 
with particular reference to industrial development. Bulle- 
tin of U. S. Bureau of Education Number 2, Washington; 
1906. ^ 

Huxley, Thomas H. Technical Education. See Ms Science and 
Education Essays. Appleton, New York; 1894. 

Kikuchi, Dairoku, Baron. Technical Education. See Ms Japan- 
ese Education. Murray, London; 1909. 

Meyer, Ernst G., and others. Industrial Education and Indus- 
trial Conditions in Germany. U. S. Special Consular Re- 
ports. Vol. 33. Washington; 1905. 

Mark, H. T. Education and Industry in the United States. See 
Great Britain — Board of Education, Education in the 
United States. Wyman, London; 1902. 

Ontario (Province). Education Department. Annual Reports, 
1907-10. Appendices to report of Minister of Education. 
Toronto; 1908. 

U. S. Department of Labor. Trade and Technical Education. 
17th annual report of the Commissioner of Labor. Washing- 
ton; 1902. 

U. S. Department of Labor. Trade and Technical Education in 
the U. S. See U. S. Bureau of Labor Bulletin No. 53. 
Washington; 1904. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 351 



BEARING OF TRADES UNIONS. 

Adams, Thomas S. and Sumner, Helen L. Industrial Education. 
See their Labor Problems. MacMillan, New York; 1905. 

American Federation of Labor. Industrial Education, consisting 
of an investigation and report by a special committee. Pub- 
lished by the A. F. of L., Washington; 1910. 

Chicago Federation of Labor. Protection of the Health and 
Motherhood of the Working Women of Illinois. Bulletin 
of the Federation, Chicago; 1909. 

Motley, James M. Apprenticeship in the Building Trades. See 
Studies in American Trade Unionism. Holt, New York; 
1906. 

Motley, James M. Apprenticeship in American Trade Unions. 
Published by Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore; 1907. 

Richards, Charles R. Industrial Training, a report on condi- 
tions in New York State, prepared for the Bureau of Labor 
Statistics, Albany; 1909. 

Vanderlip, Frank A. Trade Schools and Labor Unions. See his 
Business and Education. Duffield, New York; 1907. 

Webb, Sidney and Beatrice. History of Trade Unionism. Long- 
mans, New York; 1902. 

Weyl, Walter E. and Sakolski, A. M. Conditions of Entrance to 
the Principal Trades. See U. S. Bureau of Labor Bulletin 
No. 67, Washington; 1906. 

MANUxVL TRAINING. 

Dopp, Katherine E. The Place of Industries in Elementary 

Education. Chicago University Press, Chicago; 1907. 
Ham, Charles H. Mind and Hand : ]\Ianual Training the Chief 

Factor in Education. American Book Co., New York; 1900. 
Kentj Ernest B. Elementary School and Industrial Occupations. 

See Elementary School Teacher, Volume 9. University of 

Chicago Press, Chicago; 1908. 
Woodward, Calvin M. Manual Training in Education. Scrib- 

ner's, New York; 1898. 



352 BIBLIOGRAPHY 



HOUSEHOLD ARTS. 

Burstall, Sara A. Home Economics and Industrial Education for 
Girls. See her Impressions of American Education. Long- 
mans, New York; 1909. 

Campbell, Mrs. Helen S. Household Economics, a course of lec- 
tures in the school of economics of the University of Wis- 
consin. Putnam, New York; 1897. 

Great Britain — Board of Education. School Training for the 
Home Duties of Women. Special reports on educational sub- 
jects. Vols. 15-16. Wyman, London; 1905-06. 

Lake Placid Conference on Home Economics. Proceedings of 
annual conferences 1899-1906. Sec'y of Conference, Mrs. 
Melvil Dewey, Lake Placid, New York. 

MacCracken, Elizabeth. Women of America. MacMillan, New 
York; 1904. 

Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics of Labor. Trained and Sup- 
plemental Employees for Domestic Service. See Bureau's 
37th Annual Report, Boston; 1907. 

Richardson, Bertha J. The Woman Who Spends, a study of her 
economic function. Whitcomb, Boston; 1904. 

Salmon, Lucy M. Domestic Service. MacMillan, New York; 
1897. 

Salmon, Lucy M. Education in the Household. See her Progress 
in the Household. Houghton, Boston; 1906. 

TRADE SCHOOLS. 

Bolen, George L. Learning a Trade. See his Getting a Living. 
MacMillan, New York; 1903. 

Dean, Arthur D. Education of Workers in the Shoe Industry. 
Bulletin of National Society for Promotion of Industrial Edu- 
cation Number 8. New York; 1908. 

Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics of Labor. Organization of 
Trade Schools. 1906. Boston. 

Woolman, Mary S. Trade Schools and Culture. See Educational 
Review. Vol. 37. Feb., 1909. Educational Review Publish- 
ing Company, New York; 1909. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 353 

Woolman, Mary S. Making of a Girls' Trade School. Teachers' 
College Record. Sept., 1909. Columbia University Press, 
New York; 1909. 

APPRENTICESHIP. 

Apprenticeship and Skilled Employment Association, London. 
Trades for London Boys and How to Enter Them. Long- 
mans, New York; 1908. 

Apprenticeship and Skilled Employment Association, London. 
Trades for London Girls and How to Enter Them. Long- 
mans, New York, 1909. 

Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics of Labor. Apprenticeship 
System. See Bureau's 37th Annual Report. Boston, 1907. 

Mitchell, John. The Passing of the Apprentice. 8ee his Organ- 
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